Lemington Gut

 

The Gut 

Newburn Haugh 

Lemington 

Saltmarsh

Layers from the beginning of the Industrial Revolution. Prerailway .

When the river was still king .

Before it was annexed for the main river to flow faster this small part of South Tyne is now tucked into the edge of promise the new industry , no industry .

This small part of the Tyne encapsulates like so much of our industrial past out journey through wars innovations, through carbon, and into the nuclear . Weapons and power, this butterfly meadow this horse paddock made glass , made bombs to the minerals of the north and sent them out to the world .

Shells to kill boys and men . 

We sit proud and conflicted and defensive . 

We sit in Orchids and vetch 

The burn filled with slag, rubble and silt 

Bubbling with its own air 

Hemlock Summer.

Iron chain , furnace holes ,streams , sewage ,  slicks