Share   Print  Save   Become a Fan

This area of Yorkshire, England is where poet Ted Hughes was born and lived with American poet Sylvia Plath

HEBDEN BRIDGE & HEPTONSTALL

At last returning
to the valleys
of Calder and Hebden

after all these
months of sunshine
and little rain

through Friendly
Slack Bottom
Mytholmroyd

how could it
be anything else
but bitter ?

Hebden Bridge
once clamoured
with harsh sounds

of wooden clog
and packhorse hoof
on millstone grit

water powered
manic looms
infernal mills

and the coal fire
always waiting
at the station

now tourist cars
gift shops, boat rides
and coffee bars

Heptonstall
still perched
like a dark bird

high on the rock
- eventually
we found Sylvia’s

simple grave
where surely
she is foreign

amidst all this
diabolical
Pennine weather