Rhododendrons

William Armstrong made his fortune
Flogging weapons to the World;
Spanning rivers with his iron bridges.
One, by hydraulic power, opened like a jaw
For William's ships to pass along the Tyne.
Newcastle's townsmen toiled in his workshops,
On Sundays worshiped in the churches he endowed,
Disported in the park he gave the town.

When he was old, like Kublai Khan,
He built himself a palace
Covered with pepperpots and turrets,
High on a bleak Northumbrian moorland
That he clothed with trees. Like God, he said
‘Let there be light!’ and there was light,
Born of his turbines — turned by falls
Cascading from new lakes he filled
With fish for friends to catch.
Transplanted from the Himalayas,
He brought the new found rhododendrons.
Burgeoning and billowing like a great
Green eiderdown, they swallowed up
His pepperpots and turrets, turned his palace
Into a Sleeping Beauty, too fast asleep
For any Prince to reach.