Rolled gold

Rolled gold

Haystacks

Big fat bales

Piled high

In dry fields

Ankle deep with

Needlepoint stalks

Easily reconfigured

Into battlements

Hideouts

Enemy entrenchments

Sometimes they caught fire

Nobody ever owned up

The brigade was called

Hoses unrolled

A snaking

Monty Python

Stretched tight

Barely reaching

We watched from a distance

Just wait until dad

Gets home

Is what we were told

As the fire caught hold

The red-faced farmer raged

His pink eyes blazed

A bull-headed man

With a grudge

All I know is

When he fired a gun

He made us run

More times than I would

Care to mention