In Cowleaze Wood, not far from the telecoms mast at Stokenchurch, just off the M40 where it cuts through the Chilterns, there is a small memorial to the crew of a Hampden, which crashed returning damaged from a operation. It’s a mournful place, where the birdsong seems somehow muted, but someone occasionally places flowers there. It puts me in mind of this poem, written in 1941 by Herbert Corby
MISSING
They told me when they cut the ready wheat,
The hares are suddenly homeless and afraid,
And aimlessly circle the stubble with scared feet,
Finding no place in sunlight or in shade.
It’s morning, and the Hampdens have returned.
The crews are home, have stretched and laughed and gone,
Whence the planes came and the Chance-light burned
The sun has ridden the sky and made the dawn.
-He walks distraught, circling the landing-ground,
Waiting the last one home that won’t come back,
And like those hares, he wanders round and round,
Lost and desolate on the close-cropped track.
Last edited by FNG; 4th Apr 2004 at 21:12.