Dear Have Your Say

Many thanks to you and your team for allowing us to take up your valuable time, we have decided to write a poem to celebrate the fantastic work that you all do as a summary of our project, which we will be presenting to our tutors and peers later this month.

As soon as we have finalised it we will send you a copy and would hope that you could find space to publish it in your next edition of the HYS magazine.

Once again, thanks and it was a fun and informative morning for all of us.

Take care, Tracy, Sian, Jen, Tomoko and Claudia. MMU MA Students

Untitled Poem

A Peri-urban area, what does it mean?
Near the countryside, the city or somewhere in between?
When researching for our project we quickly found a place
Miles Platting the name - A decent size space -
We started doing some research on the area in the past
The things that still remain and the things that did not last
The mills standing proud, still being used today
The cinemas and factories now sadly gone away
The picturesque canal and the ground where sports are played
We were shocked to see the empty houses
People's loyalty had strayed
We did some further research and began to surf the 'net
And were delighted to find a local group who regularly met
"Have Your Say" the group were called
After seeing their work we became enthralled!
Our next steps were to meet Have Your Say
To find out where they work, they socialise and play
They kindly welcomed us in and showed us what they do
Made us tea, were good company and told us all they knew
The stories that they told us, we all thought were great
There was so much to find out that the meeting ran late!
We heard of the bands in the area that used to play
The uniforms they wore and the old school days
We heard of the houses, the gasworks and shops
The memories still fresh although things had been lost
After meeting we were all so amazed
The work done by Have Your Say,
We thought should be praised
The magazine brings together the people who live there
It reunites friends, publishes memories that they share
We would like to say a big thank you to everyone at Have Your Say
For being so welcoming and making our day
In terms of the future, we wish you all the best
We think that all your hard work deserves a well earned rest