seasons |
THE CLEMATIS HEDGE I had a lovely hedge - so full of bloom In winter, strangers wandered by to stare. I’d pause and chat while leaning on my broom, Happy explaining, happier still to share The shelter that it gave above the wall To runners from rainstorms, children’s hide and seek Amid the long leaves tumbling. This all Gave pleasure, until late last week When men and shrieking saws without consent Devastated my Clematis, and left Nothing but shorn twigs. They haven’t sent A bill - the work was free. But I’m bereft. Where will the blackbird make his home this spring? Where will the wren hide? And our robin sing? ............................................................................... SPRING...? It’s March the First; the weathermen And women cry, “It’s Spring again!” Despite the blizzards in the hills And hardly any daffodils. The frogs are humping in the pond, One fern has made a tiny frond, But not a leaf is on the trees And walkers hunch against the breeze. The Sun is barely in the Fish, Whatever our presenters wish; The Equinox is weeks away, Whatever weather pundits say. The astronomic start of Spring, Bright catalyst for everything, Is when our star burns the Equator In the Ram, the life-creator. Dishonouring St. David’s Day, Our sense of time has gone astray. Disdaining sleep, we raid the night For hours extravagant with light. We chill the heat, we heat the cold, Stay adolescent till we’re old; Dress up our children to attract And then get stars and teachers sacked. Refuse to rest, refuse to die, Insist we have the right to fly, To play God with the biosphere Since we are all that matters here. Come back, St. David! Help us back To sanity! We’ve lost the knack Of simple living, sold our souls To self-esteem, commercial goals. I long for unpolluted air, For bees and beasties everywhere, I’d like a night alive with stars, Not nasty neon clubs and bars. I long for peace, untainted bread, The pulse of Heaven in my head. I’d like a weather-girl to say “It really will be Spring today” ........................................................................................................ The Gun I’d like some pretty with my cold. This winter is already old, And not a frost, and not a flake Has twinkled on our town to break The nithering monotony Of January by the sea. The days are grey, the mood is low; We haven’t had our share of snow. No-one wants to walk the Orme, Dull without a winter storm. I wish that I could find a way To brighten everybody’s day! I’d love to have the magic gun That makes a blizzard in the sun, That showers ice on everyone! I’d love to point the cannon high And fill the January sky With dancing flakes that float and fly! My gun would freeze the salty air And frost would sparkle everywhere, Flashing diamonds through the waves, Dazzling crystal in the caves; Our beach an arc of shining snow In winds that make our faces glow. We’d walk beneath the frosted trees Tinkling like piano keys Under the fingers of the breeze, And everyone would smile and say As happy people crowd the bay, ‘What a glorious Winter’s day! We need some pretty with our cold To charm the young and cheer the old; Gardens white as wedding cake, Skaters out on every lake, A frost-fair on the glassy sea - So bring my magic gun to me! ............................................................... CAREFREE ANGLO-IRISH CYCLING SONG! ‘Tis a lovely Sunday mornin’ makes me glad to be alive, ‘Tis the kind of misty mornin’ when the scents o’ summer thrive! O the fish is up an’ the milk is up, an’ the rest they lie abed, While I’m ridin’ down the seaside with a singin’ in my head! There’s a little bit o’ cloud about; the sun is peerin’ through, An’ the lupins an’ the roses are bespeckled with the dew ... O ... etc! An’ the swallows are a-flyin’, an’ the seagulls overhead Are a-wheelin’ and a-cryin’, will I give them bits o’ bread? O ... etc! An’ the sun is all for makin’ golden ribbons in the sea, An’ the silver fish are swimmin’ up the shingle just for me! O ... etc! ................................................................................................ HEARTSEASE Though Hearts-ease lasts until the autumn only, When the leaves fall, Heart’s ease stays with us throughout the year So that sweet memories we may recall Of the little wild pansy Beloved of all. (Lowfell, 1950, age 7. My very first poem.) ................................................................................................ WHITE MAGIC When I awoke, ‘twas very early morn - The night had not yet given birth to dawn - And oh! How still it was! As if a fairy hand Had transformed the ordinary world into a wonderland Of sparkling snow and ice ... untouched as yet (For later on I knew that trampling feet Would turn this ethereal paradise into a slushy street.) Every branch was bowed down with the weight Of the glittering burden that it held; On every tinsel wire the strain was great. The street lamps bathed the snow in pools of gold. And, the crowning glory of this peaceful scene, The moon sailed in the heavens, calm and serene, Shedding unearthly radiance all around, Making the snow gleam softly on the ground. The air was clear as crystal, sparkling clear; The sky was like black velvet, diamond-studded. Each icycle hung like a frozen tear. Then, in a breath of wind, the white trees shuddered; Clouds gathered in the frozen atmosphere. Suddenly the air was full of whirling, Tossing, drifting, flying silver snowflakes, Gaily dancing hither, thither, swiftly swirling ... And in the midst of this the day awakes. The magic of the early morn is now Broken by the new-born light of day And blotted out by clouds of driving snow While the darkness gradually fades away. (Winter, Brooklands, early 1951, age 8) ............................................................................................... FOR AN AUTUMN WEDDING All is prepared. The slow white wedding-march of clouds, Sweeping the late leaves with skirts of rain, Have spread you a bright carpet in celebration. See, as you come, Golden slippers of sun run in the woodland, Lighting candles amidst the vaulting shade To make you a church of many aisles and altars. Listen together; The wind’s fine fingers fly on the organ. There are bells in the birds’ full throats for you, The leaves fall to their own gentle music. Their light kiss Upon your hair is of life and death; they speak With the ancient forest voice whose wisdom flows In root and seed, fed by the grey rain. Listen, and learn; How the brown earth, laced with a veil of leaves, Makes many weddings; death is a season’s sleep, Life a recurring dream from that rich bed. You are consumed Like leaves, gold in your every changing season, Dancing through lives and deaths, an immortal vein Of past selves ripening in the dark To nurture spring. ............................................................................................... GIRLS WITH GOLDEN HAIR Girls with golden hair were Meant to stand in the flowing corn Slender as the wheatstalks They stand among Between earth and cloud Pale in the lissom wind their long Hair showered with finely Flying seed To walk in the ripened year Bearing golden before them a swelling Legacy of secret Eyes that saw them ................................................................................................ SPRING AGAIN Having done Spring to death - forever, I thought, Amen - it poked a mauve nose out of the grass at me, Winked a gold eye, and Became. With little eddies of lust awhirl in the March wind Around the knees, frisking fresh girls out walking Tip-toe, tongues out they and the sky still For a taste, for a thrill of snow; cool, Baby, can’t kick the habit! Will stick my nose soon into a bud of wet lilac (We’ll gather lilacs in the Spring again When your incessant runabout breaks down Or one of your old, old ladies, waltzing gaily Out of a doorful of roses, Trips you with a giggle and sprouting stick) Oh soon we’ll roll in faggots of crushed lavender, And go without umbrellas in the rain, Again! ................................................................................................ SPRING-CLEAN Spring wind. Fever wind. Wowy round the roof-tops. Wind. Blood coming up for the new year, for next year’s prelude of memories. As flames shake out fresh with a sound of handkerchiefs And trees bud birds to race the arriving sky. Weep over the leavings of last year, We’re done with pigeon-pie. This year cry sea-gull, and keep a nipped finger till next March. The sun starts now, practising for summer. Surprised by the end of winter, detergent comes with free daffodils, Opulent ladies begin playing at charities As February waltzes out in the girls’ Excuse-me And March comes in late, looking sheepish, with hocus-crocus of mad March babies and royal hair As Woolworth plies the primrose path to Mother’s day. Out in the blue air of Sundays, people whistle and wash-leather their cars With radios out on the pavement and soapy streams in the gutter until ... Lo! More snow (everyone back inside: Shilling for the gas, homework over hot crumpets and butter) In March shivers, blowing like sand over the sea-slates Or winter shook the last crumbs out of his cold cloth for the visiting sun to peck at Come on, spring! Buck up, it’s nearly the silly season! The trees are all bark, the wind all sarcastic bite But the almond has pinkened ever since Valentine’s Day And it won’t be long before sun, wind and trees make friends in a jolly rape of petals On weekend anniversaries Of so many, So enjoyably Lost virginities! - But meantime it’s spring wind, chilly wind, Draught up the trouserlegs, scarves on rag-day Wind As the twigs chirrup with perhaps a little frost Teasing the sap under the tickle of lambing-time, And it’s a toss-up between Cold fingers, or resisting the pleasure Of smoking the kissing-season’s first fresh-air cigarette. ................................................................................................ THE BELOVED GARDENS (for Frank) Amid the noise In millions, clangour of men Sweating for self-praise; In the misapprehension of iron, time-lapse, toil, Germ in the pantry and Universal hand; By greenless villa, lock and staring cell Earth’s plumage plucked, Muscle Treated and trussed, Fit flesh for biting; Amid new bulls without horn, Plant without sap or seed, Amid the un-flighted cranes Go they, The gardeners go Forth secretly to the beloved gardens. Among dog-daisies And wild rose, Treading over the long fought-for silence Of grass imperishable They give their good-days, They go forgotten ways, They bend, and disappear. They open the long-locked ear Of Time within; And all the ages gone when the sun shone Straight from eye to eye Subtly take possession of their mind. Bramble and woodbine, Spurge, owled oak, and willow Welcome homeward the slow dreamer, the old fellow. His one friend sits by him and sings. Mole, hole and hedgerow watch with a noonday eye For the unwanted things. Few come here to learn economy. He, root-bent, researching the earth, Tends to the only immortality. It will receive him; And shall give rebirth To dog-daisies, Bramble and woodbine, Spurge, owled oak, willow And wild rose, To moth, fireweed, nettle and nightingale Amid the noise. ................................................................................................ DISASTER Here are the people waiting Against the flowing sea Down the banks of shingle The sun is circled with fog We swim in the idle tide The children fidget and argue They balance along the ropes The ropes that loosed the lifeboat Washed away in the mist To the lonely mooing at sea The people read their papers They sleep in the Sunday sun A ship is lost in limbo The fog is heavy with souls Here are the people waiting On the blond and shimmering shingle A little too cold to swim In the blue and tinsel sea The women are thinking of lunch And the boat has not come back ............................................................................................... CONCEPTION I shall, calm-eyed, Shake out my blankets in the sun And sheets out like flags Until bearing. The many flowers Race to grow faster than my melon- Belly, round and ripe as a Pink cantaloupe. I shall Lily and Amaranth Plant among my hair and Golden feet. The thrush’s song Shall await my shout before Giving tongue to war Over the world’s edge. I shall give A new priest to the sea: Our kind is growing, who never Blaspheme her beauty. Our race, Gentle as wave or wind, Will help poor God to soothe The hot world. ................................................................................................ MAYTIME Maiden Kent in her first blush of blossom Led in the Maytime to an orchard bridal Uphill and downland black gorse put to the torch Takes the coin of the sun and scatters it In the path of wayfarers amid weddings Who weave among reed-beds bittern and weed To water-sheets In the deep woodland waits A reflected heaven All the trees breathing a blue gas Drift in a lake of altered consciousness And all the bells are birds ................................................................................................ OCTOBER 16th 1987 The wind whines in the gratings. It is a mean cur Leaping and baying at the last of the trees. This night it pulls on a leash, still By some harsh hand held between towering seas And we pray again, as we prayed under a Scorpio Moon (Piteously, in vain) the tyrant fist Of air not follow its hound to scythe and flail In seven howling hours seven counties' forest. Felled trees flake into humus; rooftops wrenched Break into powder and shard, a thin seam Laid down, pointing the future's history. Will fear come up on the spade? Will their seers dream? Blood was not the storm's quarry but only our sleep, Only our sleep, Lord; an amazing Hand Held our houses safe from cedar and oak. Only a few died, leaving a shattered land To greet us in the morning under the grinning sun, A lone light, and all our power gone. Powerless, we who had tamed the lightning. Stripped of all we had built our silly lives upon. ................................................................................................ AUTUMN KISSES Breeze-blown fairy filaments arriving on the wind Dance carelessly Lightly floating on the breath around the lips And brush them ... Bowling soft and airily through coltsfoot stems and grass And hovering Catch on flying hair and whisper on the ears Like kisses Blown from one white tower on a hilltop far away A tiny speck In the autumn haze of trees beyond the town ... From your lips...? ................................................................................................ THE FIRST BULLFINCH Rose-breasted, bobbing bird on the pathway, Slate-blue back in the sun flashing steel, Picking and hopping, And stopping; White rump-splash bobbing, And robbing Small, hidden, crevice-grown weeds Of seeds - Where have you been? Why before have I never seen Handfuls of sky-blown rose-flame, Twig-bending plumply In the sun-flecked mazes - A steel-winged, Pink-puffed Thistle-tuft Like you? ................................................................................................ THE FRIGHTFUL BLIZZARD The tree-snakes have been frozen in mid-strike. Each Medusa-head froze at the stare of her image in ice When the sky splintered in the frightful blizzard of mirrors. Golden pheasants walk immortal in the fields, the angels of this whited sepulchre; The sun blared out like a trumpet once amid the muffled drums - Their muted throbbing has died in the whole land. People sit with dead eyes in the snow-caves, the last flutes play under the ice-cliffs, The country lies wrapped in her winding-sheet. The tears of the wind lie like funeral flowers on her lips And cover her still face with the blossoms of the snow. The shadow of God's sleep lies over the land. When will the eye of Heaven look on the land? When will the long and painful healing begin? ................................................................................................ TIME-TRAP The moths and the white winter spiders have won - All over the land their matted webs are spun. They have trapped liquid time in ice at last. Nothing goes or grows in the frozen froth of grass. Space to one clouded crystal distilled, With the glittering sediment of suspended time filled. See these frost-fountains? Once, life In the poplar skyward flowed. This was a stream, this knife. The only time, space, un-silence is What we can drive between the killing traceries. Rails running through cloud. Grey travelling. One harsh frightening bray, and doom unravelling. ................................................................................................ IS THIS THEN WHERE IT ALL ENDS? Is this then where it all ends? In this flashing maniac of a train? And the fast dark dancing with mad white light? The rails alive with rainbows? The spiteful brilliance spits against my window And shows things flickering like a crazy film; And presently, in mile-high horrible letters, Will THE END explode our ears and everything Stop? |