We do not sing East Hatley,
It’s not a lyric name!
To find a rhyme for Hatley
Would be a testing game.

It has few redeeming features,
Some say its name is mud,
Its alpacas are exotic,
They’re not of British blood.

The church was made redundant,
Wild Nature got her way.
The moat became truncated
And are ditches in decay.

But there’s heart still in its people,
Though we’re not all local breed.
The Coffee Morning’s crowded.
Some run, some run to seed.

Some walk Buff Wood to study birds
And some to stretch their legs.
We fetch each other’s papers
And we buy each other’s eggs.

So sing a song of Hatley,
A village of its day.
Let’s say it rather flatly,
We like it just this way.

_{Ishbel Beatty, February 2017}