Dancing Dust
	Poems by Mollie Caird (1922-2000)
	Port Meadow
Home Alphabetic index of poems Thematic index of poems Biography Gallery Contact and links	Rosamund lay in Godstow walls, My love, my royal love she cried, The abbess prayed and the winecup passed; Wishes are horses and beggars ride. A green-haired girl jumps down from her van, A stud in her nose and a scar on her brow, She runs with her dog and her dog with his fleas; This place has never known the plough. An archaeologist stirs the mound, Sifts the dust where the bronze man died, Some ash and a bone and a twisted ring; Wishes are horses and beggars ride. Where Rosamund lay the birthwort grows, The hummocked walls are crumbled now And plastic picnics strew the grass; This place has never known the plough. Seven crows perch in a poplar tree, Eleven swans on the river glide, Green with nitrates, heavy with lead; Wishes are horses and beggars ride. Geese on the racetrack, ghosts at the lock, Undieselled ghosts at the narrowboat’s prow; Wishes are horses and beggars ride, This place has never known the plough. Undated Island City: Oxford poems by living poets, 1999