13th July 2026
A steep one-in-eight is the slope of the hill,
Where twenty-four houses stand heavy and still,
They rest at the crest, looking down on the glade,
Unaware of the fracture that’s soon to be made.
For down at the bottom, where water does flow.
The blueprint planning intents start to show:
An application called DC/097786,
To cram three more plots in the mud and the bricks.
The slope is a shield made of timber and stone,
Where ancient, majestic wood-giants have grown.
The ash and the oak and the sycamore stand,
With TPO badges to guard their own land.
Protected by law, or so we were told,
But laws can be bent when a scheme unfolds.
For developer Greg Hall has cast a cold eye,
And decided one sycamore tree has to die.
“It’s only one tree,” the developer claims,
A single green casualty lost to his game.
But chop out the toe of a one-in-eight hill,
And gravity works with a dangerous will.
The earth will remember, the water will flow,
When the roots are ripped loose from the valley below.
What holds up the crest when the base is undone?
The safety of decades undone for just one.
Step into the canopy, listen and look,
At the wild, living heart of our own Padden Brook.
The foxes that forage, the squirrels that leap,
The birds in the branches that nest while we sleep.
They don’t have a voice in the council’s debate,
They don’t get a vote on this brick-and-mortar fate.
But their home is the woodland, the slope is their ground,
Where the rhythm of nature is the ultimate sound.
So stand for the sycamore, stand for the hill,
Before the first engine is started to drill.
We say no to the greed and the concrete design,
We say no to the cross on the TPO line.
Keep the roots in the soil, keep the canopy high,
Don’t let Padden Brook’s wildlife be forced to say goodbye.
Mr Hall, take your blueprints and pack up your crew,
This woodland belongs to the wild, not to you.
Anon
