Geoffrey Winch
Not seeing the light
missed the sunrise missed so much again
Every Saturday and Wednesday the Market Place in my hometown of Reading was jam-packed with stalls selling everything from sweets and crockery to bedding and clothes, and the air would be filled with aromas of fresh vegetables and fruit, fish and meat. It was a raucous place, crowded with shoppers, and every trader seemed to shout their wares—so unlike the rest of the town centre with its plate glass window displays and shoppers shopping in a leisurely style.
As a child this contrast fascinated me, as did the contrast of the Market Place itself on other days of the week, when it was just an empty cobbled and tarmacked wedge-shaped space between two merging roads where a sense of calm prevailed. Then there was time to take in the surroundings—the small shops, estate agencies and banks around the periphery, and the flintwork of Saint Laurence’s church tower at the northern end with the Town Hall beyond.
In the middle, at the narrow end, steps led to underground public toilets, and above these stood a triangular-shaped stone obelisk about ten or twelve feet high. This feature always seemed to be lost among the stalls and shoppers on market days and, in my late teens, when I often walked that way to work, I just accepted its presence. Not once did it ever occur to me to wonder why it was there—it was simply the stone obelisk which had flower baskets attached to it.
It was decades after I left my hometown that I decided to enquire, and discovered it was Edward Simeon—a Reading-born City of London Trader—who commissioned it, and John Soane, a local architect, who designed and installed it in 1804 to carry lamps to provide lighting for the area. In 1805 Simeon donated an annuity to pay for the lamps, stipulating they had to be lit in perpetuity—”perpetuity” in this case lasted until 1911, when his lamps were replaced by the flower baskets.
cloudy night
somewhere
the moon
About the Author
Geoffrey Winch, a retired highway engineer, writes free form poetry; haiku; haibun; tanka; tanka prose, and cherita. He is the author of five poetry collections and lives on the south coast of England.