• OUR Belsize Community Library is a listed building which is a community centre where people of all ages meet, where activities of many sorts are held, where local councillors hold their surgeries, where people cast their votes at elections.

But since it is no longer funded by Camden Council it needs money to continue its work. We who love it have fought for its existence for years; now we ask for donations to ensure its survival, as these lines explain.

Today The Struggle
“Tomorrow… the poets exploding like bombs… but today the struggle.”
– WH Auden

We thought – at least we hoped – that it was done.
They tried to close us down – but we’re still here
And will survive – why not ? – for many a year.
We fought and fought and finally we won.

Not quite. Survival needs support. Good will
Of course. But let’s be frank now : money too.
It is amazing what some cash can do
And how the lack of it turns good to ill.

This library’s at stake. It’s ours, it’s yours,
It’s theirs, it’s everyone’s. Can you not feel
How a donation to it is a deal
That makes your kindness manifest and pours

Compassion out where it is needed most ?
The children, adults, oldsters for whom it
Provides a hub where all can safely sit
And read and think need it to be their host.
Join it and use it but do not forget
Its future is by no means settled yet!

ROBERT ILSON