I am at home in the wilderness
watching the town’s bustle from distant
vantage points beyond fellowship’s reach.
The tracery of forgotten streams
curves around me with a soft comfort,
heated by the indifferent sun.
Warm rising air lifts the outstretched wings
as, head still, the hawk watches, cold-eyed,
ready to pursue his dark ethic –
kill or starve. Here, sheltered from the truth
of connection, from love’s sand paper,
I can hover, cladded by stillness.
The days fall to foam, some crashing
in exuberance on the wind swept strand,
some subsiding limply in cold solitude.
They leave a scum-line,
a heap of fly blown seaweed
or lethal discards of plastic,
and the leavings are scavenged by
the thoughtless energy of life.
Their journey across the unknown,
moon-struck, stirred by strange currents,
comes only to this evaporation.
When did I learn to pass by
as the thin gruel of humanity
clutches its bags and shivers
in the shadows?
I may avert my eyes,
become pressed upon some business,
but always, in my fear, I judge.
The dock is too small,
bursting with villainy.
It is my home.
It stands entire against
all the rage of history.
The winds hurl across
the unresisting seas,
sweeping clear the barren peat lands,
then crash, bewildered into
this complacent monster.
Below, Arkle waits for a turn
in the limelight.
It listens to the hidden
disintegration of shale
as Foinavon succumbs,
where tempests cannot reach,
to the relentless patience of Time.
The handshake explains itself;
beyond the closed boxes of words,
where angles dissolve, and shapes
hold the tenderness of raindrops.
It has a fleeting wisdom
that lodges in hidden corners
so skin can shelter from grief
and mind can construct a square life.
The explanation remains –
the shared disappointments of love,
or desire’s trembling quiver,
a buttress to failing courage
or rivalry’s robust grip –
all in muscle’s wordless memory
where reason’s stiff boned fingers
find no reassuring purchase.
The caress of skin on skin
like wrapt gazes’ exchange of light,
leaves no visible trace of
the mystery of connection.
.
Pale light, softened by the grey green glass,
Shaded into darkness,
But offering a stillness, marked precisely
By the still candle flames that guard
And measure the peace.
In the softness, a circle of chairs
Stand waiting. Their angles
Suggest fellowship to come, but also choice
Of solitude where a quiet sob
Or groan is the off’ring.
Here we are sheltered from the urgent
Noise of the icy winds
That cover the city’s contours with filmy
Eye water, draining texture and shape
Narrowing horizons.
Here eyes rest and heads clear, looking up
At last, daring to see
Something wider, something beautiful
Amidst the tired industrial life
Of the Medway landscape.
Rather old Winter visit – somewhere around 2000…………
There is a drained look about them
in the casual buffeting of the wind.
Death paints their nails a dry yellow
and they bow to indifference.
They are at home in the grey skies
of empty bypassed landscapes.
I look down on them from my world
and paint them with my palate.
Unseen, the mouse sleeps, the spider
creates its drama, new birth
scurries and an empire is built.
