Audio Description

Maggie’s Selby Connection

All the things she loves and values about her new home of Selby.

Maggie’s Selby Story

This is where I live now

This is where I live now.
A house cleansed of past lives,
made new by skilful workmen,
every corner sprinkled with Holy water,
windows opened to let fresh light in.

This is where I live now,
a city of hills exchanged for flat
and sweeping fields of grain,
huge skies that frame clouds by day
and stars by night.

Now I live in this humble town that bustles
on market days, sleeps through the rest,
takes pride in its history and honours the lives 
of its young men given in war.

This town, circled by rivers and canals,
with industries smashed by political axes,
a community of survivors with coal-dust ground
into their skin and lungs, but able to change.

This is my neighbourhood now,
where people stop and say hello,
who share years of wisdom as they pass by.
Generosity and kindness flourish here.

This is where I will spend my days,
living hospitably but in solitude too.
Glad of the light and the warmth of its welcome.
Glad to call Selby my home.

Character Collage