A Moor the Size of Yorkshire

Now that I find it hard to get lost,

Loose my way,

Or not know where the fuck I am

(Except in deep fog),

I wish for a moor the size of Yorkshire.

(Sure, a moor which comes along with fells, forests and valleys.)

Why? Just to recapture those younger days

When the around of every corner was unknown.

A vastness is what's wanted.

An open, almost endless “barren” beauty.

Stretches of heather as wide as a city.

And villages separated by dozens 

- Not a meagre two or three -

Of long and exhausting miles.

To get caught in the heather, reed and bog

For hours and hours -

Not for ten minutes or less.

To taste true exhaustion or cold.

To not see a solitary hiker

For hour after hour after hour.

In this imaginary landscape

There'd still be dry-stone walls

And derelict farms.

They're as part of this nature

As the sheep shit and the curlew's song.

True; there's no genuine wilderness in England.

But this huge moor, the size of Yorkshire,

Would come close to one.

You see, you'd never keep such a huge space

Firmly under man's control,

Or fully pruned by national trusts.