It began with the midges outside my neighbours door,
witnessing the power of attorney;
but later, by the river on the journey,
light laid an ambush for the duskdown, dour.
The solstice, soldered with a lid of lead,
jemmied open at a sun-crack smiling,
goldbrushed fences, tall seed-straws conspiring,
at winter's festival to featherbed.
How still, how mild Late Autumn cedes her reign
and gorse is for all seasons, missing you,
and scratches plenty should our habits slew
and waste return to waste - bees buzz their fame.
The seeds lit white-gold stuck still to fireweed;
in truth it turns out well a daisy day -
and ornamental dead-forms on display -
the green grow screening like an altar screed:
Ivy, algae, nettles, brambles, holly,
this charm spread wide throughout England's nadir -
we stroll be-antlered, tall this turning year,
prizes run-to-ground, cellphone photo-jolly.
Pealing light, storial in backwater,
the levels of the slow sunset embalming
the rushes and the sighed reeds dark-charming
'deep with the first dead'*, the Eve ancestor.
Later we're witnessing, beyond lawyer,
such wind lurched vicious past our Takeout door:
slick shadow that a man and girl both saw
clashed open door, blew mat across the foyer.
.....................................
*From 'A Refusal to Mourn the Death by Fire of a Child in London' by Dylan Thomas
YOU ARE READING
Greenclad.
شِعرIvy-jacketed, December oaks on road-borders shock their stark gestures at us now, through sun and sleet, that January will yawn at and February, propping eyelids, will desperately ignore, longing for blossom; and making do with the least of anything...
