Licorice fields of Pontefract.
In the licorice fields at Pontefract my love and I did meet
And many a burdened licorice bush was blooming round our feet
Red hair she had and golden skin her sulky lips were shaped for sin
Her sturdy legs were flannel-slacked the strongest legs in pontefract.
The light and dangling licorice flowers gave off the sweetest smells
From various black Victorian towers the Sunday evening bells
Came pealing over dales and hills and tanneries and silent mills
And lowly streets where country stops and little shuttered corner shops
I was her captive slave and she my red-haired robber chief
Oh love! For love I could not speak it left me winded, wilting, weak
And held in brown arms strong and bare and wound with flaming ropes of hair.
By John Betjeman.