Blythenhale*
Once, it was a beauty-spot,
that lived up to its name—
a lush and healthy place,
to stroll along, until they came.
They swallowed up the spaces
where bluebirds used to soar,
soon needing tenement buildings
to house their growing poor.
Crammed with life, not living—
a place of pox and lime,
Bethnal Green, the park
became the cess-pool layered in grime.
Matchbox girls at tables,
made cartons by the score,
Journeymen were undercut,
by traded goods galore.
Once-proud men, who worked for guilds,
fell destitute in shame,
Shoeless babes slept still at night,
but where to lay the blame?
The government provided,
the workhouse for the old,
but who could stand the labour,
the starvation, or the cold?
Some would choose to hang themselves,
before they’d rap its door;
charge Progress with the so sad fate
of Blythenhale of yore.
Kat Mortensen©2012 
*Former name of Bethnal Green, the most impoverished area of East End London during the 19th Century.
3-5-3, 3-7-5 