Higham Ferrers

This little town of ancient grace,
Disposed around a market place;
What ghost-like shadows paint your stones
With forms of yesterday!

Those same bright clouds that Chichele knew
Their ever wandering ways pursue,
While deep repose and calm endure
In churchyard, charmed and gray.

The old church bell does not forget;
Grey houses are all lovely yet;
They saw the scenes of long ago
And many a famous day!

Enchanting Higham, wrapped in fame;
Robed scholars to your college came;
Seeking for truth with probing minds
Under their chaplain's sway.

Where Chichele knew triumphant days,
And rose to pomp and power and praise -
Nobler this town has never bred,
For seen a better day.

Higham Market Day 1921

In 1921 or 1922 I watched the annual Market Day in Higham Square!

I look back to that distant summer day -
To that far, adolescent period of my life -
To that high room that overlooked the square -
Headmaster Margetts and his wife seated in window.
Then, with my family I looked down on
Stalls of produce, colourful and strange.

The amber haze of summer afternoon
Effaces time in Higham town, it glows
Enchantedly on grey stone walls and ancient house.

Then came the band - a sight and sound to stir our hearts;
Followed by mayor, his council and the powers that be -
Marching with dignity and resolution;
Turning and massing in the old time-honoured square.

How quiet the town in those now dim-remembered days.
Then I stood talking in the middle of the street,
Outside the Misses Beaver's general store;
Occasionally a cyclist or pedestrian passed by -
No cars or lorries marred the abiding quietude.

St. Mary's immense spire points heavenward
Across the way, in pride above the borough's dreaming roofs.

After the band, that all-pervading peace that liberated us
From fretting threats of war and petty rivalries.
The pageantry of golden joys, contentment's calm
Enriched our lives and soothed the quiet succession of our days.

Higham Bede House

Twelve old men still savouring old times;
Time now diminished and the joys of youth
A bright-filled nothingness.
They now are past all vanities proud men conceive.

Thin arteried, they warm their hands
At the old fireplace, filled with crepitating logs:
Their light created by some trimmed-down, guttering candles.

An aged crone is their support; to wait on them;
To satisfy their wants and minister to their meagre needs.

In the Archbishop's Bede House they sit and tell their tales;
Babbling of the glories of this famous place.
The little chantry chapel with its stately pinnacles:
The glorious windows and majestic parapets.
Here Henry Chichele walked the streets of Higham town,
And kept his father's sheep among the gentle hills.

The splendid hammerbeam roof, unchanged though centuries pass by.
The wrinkled ancient’s simple, rustic wit, their plebian minds:
The friendship of old age, as all await the mutability of fate.
Each night the last man goes to sleep lulled by the sound
Of ancient bells from Higham1s inspiring church.

Soft footsteps creak from bed to bed, as the bent beldame
Be-numbed and yawning, steals to her own spare room.

Music at Higham

The great and splendid church beside the square
Stands ageless in the mellow evening light:
AS on a desert island, while the roar
Of ceaseless traffic surges day and night.

Through the church door there bursts on trembling wings
Music: the haunting, silence glows with sound -
Richly the choir sings to the heart-filled throng;
Rolls like, a robe of gold the tide profound!

Then, silver-tongued upon the vibrant air,
The last notes of the concord flee away;
Pursued by liquid, echoes sweet, which sought
To stay their flight and urge them to delay.

The pillared grandeur; candles burning low.
The softly-tinted panes that shed a glow.
The twilight chancel where the brasses lie.
The lofty roof where the great bourdons blow -
Melodious-toned with liquid harmony -
Tuning the rhythms in our listening ears.
Those bright cascades, that breathless rise and fall,
As sound were sight, embracing wider spheres.

Open my heart to music, let me thrill
To beauty, her invincible resource.
When sings the muse her noble rhapsodies,
In me an answering stimulus enforce.

Men little thought, who raised these chiselled stones
Such sounds would, cross the nave from wall to wall.
Such splendour flood and roll into the soul,
And melody, clear-voiced, our hearts enthrall.