The Gnome Pome

Big ones, little ones, short ones, thin ones.

Smiling and laughing on the garden centre shelf.

There are gnomes, frogs, pixies, Buddhas by the score

if you look very carefully you're bound to find an elf.

Concrete naked ladies pouring jugs of water.

A Green Man staring with his tongue sticking out.

Artificial guarantees of year round colour

through frost, fog, force 10 or a lengthy Summer drought.

But something is missing from the ornamental corner,

An absence acute from our horticultural art.

A cheeky, cheery chappy to lift your very soul

bringing smiles, mirth and happiness to jollify the heart.

See, I'm a Morris dancer, I entertain the street.

You'll see me every Summer with hankies, sticks and bells .

Where's my little biddy me to dance beneath my rose bush?

To trip the light fantastic through this Summer's sunny spells.

Hear this passioned cry from the culture of our country

you Oriental moulders of the polystyrene tat.

Craft us some Morris dancers to caper 'cross the cabbage patch

build them bright and breezy with flowers on their hat.

Provide us with a side of six, all similar but different

some bearded, some portly, or a sober one by chance.

With baldricks, bows and bellpads in the colour of their side,

provide a reminder of our nation's finest dance.