Documentary

In Competition No. 3032 you were invited to provide a poem about passports.
 
While the news that British passports issued after October of next year would be navy blue rather than burgundy was heartily cheered in some quarters, others — like Nicola Sturgeon, who denounced it as ‘insular nonsense’ — weren’t so delighted. And others still wondered what all the fuss was about.
 
The full spectrum of opinion was reflected in a small but punchy entry, and in the winning line-up. Commendations go to David Silverman’s ‘Jerusalem’-inspired verse, and to Frank Upton, Sylvia Fairley and Fiona Pitt-Kethley. The winners net £25. Basil Ransome-Davies takes £30.
 

I got my first at age eleven,
A ticket to another land
Guaranteed by Ernest Bevin.
It felt like freedom in my hand.
 
I saw the Rhineland’s saddened state
Six years after the war we won;
My passport meant I couldn’t hate
The fallen enemy, the Hun.
 
A dynasty of documents
In midnight blue (or black) unbent
Any contorted inference
That Englishness was heaven-sent.