When shall I see the Thames again?

Sir John Betjemen was an English poet, architectural conservationist and broadcaster. He was the British Poet Laureate from 1974 until his death in 1984.

Here is John Betjeman’s recording of his poem Henley-on-Thames which perfectly conjures up a Henley summers day.

You’ll remember how during the war, everything in England seemed intensified and very precious because one might not see it the next day.

This is a description of Henley-on-Thames in the Thames Valley written during the war
John Betjeman

Henley-on-Thames

I see the winding water make

A short and then a shorter lake

As here stand I,

And house-boat high,

Survey the Upper Thames.

By sun the mud is amber-dyed

In ripples slow and fat and wide,

That flap against the house-boat side

And flop away in gems.

In mud and elder-scented shade

A reach away the breach is made

By dive and shout

That circles out

To Henley tower and town;