FFF55 April 15: A memory

Some high streets are full of homes

And others are for shopping.
Some for strolling aimlessly
Or traffic never stopping
This one’s prettier than most,
Its stone-lined walls are blooming
With yellow blossoms piled up high
Their petals are perfuming.
It’s Hastings town, where I’ve just been
And a nicer sight I have never seen!

That's some of the worst poetry I've ever written, but making it an exact number of words and finding rhymes makes it tricky!

You can find better 55s at The G-Man's Blog!



Back from our holidays

HASTINGS - an ode

We went on vacation to ‘Astings
And stayed at the top of the cliff
Ate seafood and saw lots of places,
And walked till our knees had gone stiff.

The journey down South was a long one
And seemed like a heck of a way
With a stop-off at Tunbridge for sarnies
It really took most of the day.

The town was once famous for water.
Kal-ee-bee-at Spring it was called.
They reckoned its power could cure ‘owt
And even stop men going bald!

The cottage was clean and quite pretty
With a wonderful view of the sea
The edge of the cliff’s in the garden.
As close as you’d want it to be.

In Hastings they have lots of cafés
With plenty of shopping at hand
But remember to take lots of money
Cos the use of bank plastic is banned.

The fishing fleet works off the beach front
And offers fresh shellfish for sale
Cos they go out each morning to fetch it
Except when it’s blowing a gale.

They store all their gear in tall net huts
That stand on the sand by the quay.
Unique – but they’re having to move some
Cos that’s where the gallery will be.

Hastings  is one of the Cinque Ports,
They say it so it sounds like ‘sink’
But there isn’t a danger of sinking.
It’s to do with the Normans, I think.



The old town of Rye is real ancient
With cobbles in every street.
They make it all look quite attractive
But they’re terribly hard on the feet!

The towns are all full of French students
Who can’t understand what you say
But they all get the message quite quickly
When you tell them to ‘Get out the way’.

At Brighton, Prince George was a peacock
He built a fun palace right there
Where he took all his mates for big parties
And sometimes a breath of sea air.



A wonderful place is the palace
Reminds you of China a lot
On account of the bamboo and dragons
And turnip-shaped domes that it’s got.

Victoria (Queen) didn’t like it
And sold it as soon as she could.
She couldn’t see sea from her bedroom
So she reckoned it wasn’t much good.

We spent the week walking on beaches
And staring out over the bay
We had a great time down in Hastings
We really must go back some day.






Just a few of my photos from the holidays. And a quick ode - with apologies to Marriott Edgar

Holiday Reading

I’m going on holiday soon to an area that I’ve never visited before. We’re off to Hastings, and one of the things I always do before any vacation is to research what’s there and who used to live in the area. After I’ve done that I try to find some holiday reading that is relevant to where I’m staying.

Apparently Dickens was fond of Hastings and gave readings at the old music hall (which is now a Yates’s Wine Lodge). The source I’m using online says “Hastings features in many of his works” but fails to identify which ones.

Another son of Hastings appears to have been Lewis Carroll who, in spite of being born in Cheshire, spent time there as a student with his good friend the artist Harry Furniss.

Catherine Cookson moved to Hastings as a young woman when she became laundry manageress of the local workhouses (later a hospital) and was married in the town. She’s a Northerner really though, and most of her books, as far as I am aware, are set in Northumberland (or at least Tyneside and higher latitudes).

Dante Gabriel Rosetti stayed in Hastings in the 1860s and apparently married Elizabeth Siddall there but he’s an artist. I suppose I could find something non-fiction about him and the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood but it’s not really what I want.

Six miles east of where we’ll be staying is the town of Rye, which also has a lot of literary connections. The town lays claim to several such as Henry James, Joseph Conrad, H G Wells, G K Chesterton and E F Benson, who wrote the Mapp and Lucia series.

So what does everyone think?  Which of the many literary giants with links to East Sussex should I choose?