Top 15 John Betjeman Quotes

I am a young executive. No cuffs than mine are cleaner;
I have a Slimline brief-case and I use the firm's Cortina.

It's strange that those we miss the most
Are those we take for granted.

Safe were those evenings of the pre-war world
When firelight shone on green linoleum,
I heard the church bells hollowing out the sky,
Deep beyond deep, like never-ending stars.

In the licorice fields at Pontefract
My love and I did meet
And many a burdened licorice bush
Was blooming round our feet;
Red hair she had and golden skin,
Her sulky lips were shaped for sin,
Her sturdy legs were flannel-slack'd
The strongest legs in Pontefract.

But I'm dying now and done for,
What on earth was all the fun for?
I am ill and old and terrified and tight.

And behind their frail partitions
Business women lie and soak,
Seeing through the draughty skylight
Flying clouds and railway smoke. Rest you there, poor unbelov'd ones,
Lap your loneliness in heat,
All too soon the tiny breakfast,
Trolley-bus and windy street!

No hope. And the X-ray photographs under his arm
Confirm the message. His wife stands timidly by.
The opposite brick-built house looks lofty and calm,
Its chimneys steady against the mackerel sky.

Oh shall I see the Thames again?
The prow-promoted gems again,
As beefy ATS
Without their hats
Come shooting through the bridge?
And "cheerioh" and "cheeri-bye"
Across the waste of waters die,
And low the mists of evening lie
And lightly skims the midge.

Stony seaboard, far and foreign,
Stony hills poured over space,
Stony outcrop of the Burren,
Stones in every fertile place.

We sat in the car park till twenty to one
And now I'm engaged to Miss Joan Hunter Dunn.

Miss J. Hunter Dunn, Miss J. Hunter Dunn,
Furnish'd and burnish'd by Aldershot sun,
What strenuous singles we played after tea,
We in the tournament — you against me!

He would have liked to say goodbye,
Shake hands with many friends.
In Highgate now his finger-bones
Stick through his finger-ends. You, God, who treat him thus and thus,
Say, "Save his soul and pray."
You ask me to believe You and
I only see decay.

Gracious Lord, oh bomb the Germans.
Spare their women for Thy Sake,
And if that is not too easy,
We will pardon Thy Mistake.
But, gracious Lord, whate'er shall be,
Don't let anyone bomb me.

He sipped at a weak hock and seltzer
As he gazed at the London skies
Through the Nottingham lace of the curtains
Or was it his bees-winged eyes?

Come, friendly bombs, and fall on Slough!
It isn't fit for humans now,
There isn't grass to graze a cow.
Swarm over, Death!