Just a-top of green Hall’s Hill
We walked in single file
Where sunny days gave us a view
For mile after mile

Through a gate, a stone wall lay
Dividing wheat from corn
And trees demanding to be climbed
Where trousers soon were torn

Soft skin was scraped against the bark
But no-one dared to cry
A sign of weakness soon would see
The insults start to fly

And when we tired of climbing trees
We all of us would follow
Our leader to that magic place
Filled with hill and hollow

It’s there our fantasies unfurled
Enacting every scene
From cowboy films or Robin Hood
And men in Lincoln green

From wriggly tin and lumps of stone
We fashioned fort or den
To fight off waves of Indians
Like those brave Custer’s men

Those simple pleasures don’t exist
In this “enlightened” time
To let your children play outside
Today would be “a crime”

If we could only turn the clock
Back to those days of yore
To give our children freedom’s rein
They’d welcome it I’m sure