The Pit Pony Poem by Paul Reed

The Pit Pony

Rating: 5.0


I found out with sadness about your plight
Your life lived in perpetual night
An underground stable was where you roomed
An innocent life entombed

You were so trusting and willing
You must have dreamt of fulfilling
The wish to be back above ground
With green fields and trees all around

For fifty weeks a year this was your cell
With hot grimy air and sulphuric smell
Until that wonderful liberation
That exhilarating rising sensation

Of the pit cage approaching ground level
With you on board about to revel
In the freedom of the new fresh air
With pastures around you everywhere

Behold for a fortnight at ground zero
This doughty and unsung equine hero
Far from Epsom and the thoroughbred race
Whose life was entwined with the black coal face

COMMENTS OF THE POEM
John Beaton 23 August 2019

Fine poem, Paul. It made me think of cattle in Orkney. They're kept in barns all winter then trucked out to open fields in spring. When they're released they bound and frolic with manifest joy. Your poem gives the pony's two weeks a similar flavor, all the more bittersweet for being so short.

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Kathy Van Kurin 02 March 2017

Paul Gerard Reed, My goodness you gave this such life! I loved seeing hope in a rather grim situation. Willing and trusting...........for fifty weeks a year. This gives good context for me in the personal explanation within your poem................I was so pleased to know there was literally hope at the end of the tunnel for your fine little pony...............Blessings...........Kathy

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Jak Black 30 April 2015

Great, a wonderful read.

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