Lichfield

When I was in primary school
I used to play out
with the kids down the road.
We ran through the back gardens,
crawled through hedges, climbed trees
and talked conspiratorially about
which Power Ranger we would be
what sex was
whether Man U were the best
and we decided that we weren’t English, actually
maybe we were French
maybe we were changelings
maybe we were aliens
so we ran away
without even leaving the street.

I grew up on this tiny little island
that wasn’t France
or another planet
but I see it now
as exotic as my immigrant mother
used to tell me while we drove through
the rolling hills and endless green,
“Look how beautiful this island is."