POETRY

A selection of my poems for August

Sunrise from GREENBANKS, Falmouth, Cornwall.

MIRAGE

Out of the field, trotting with silent tread,

through nettles, under birch and hazel boughs,

we’d seen the signs : he’d visited before,

in winter’s frost and January’s snow…

but not mid-afternoon in hot July.

Nonchalantly jogging, taking his time,

passed dozing family cat across parched lawn,

he paused to look about, close by the house,

ignoring us although we’d caught his eye.

He held us all transfixed. No thought fox this –

but real – unlike Hughes’ dream. We watched him go

on down the drive, beyond the patio

where we all rubbed our eyes at what we’d seen.

MORE HOME THOUGHTS FROM ABROAD.

Outside the airport, waiting for the bus.

Sauna heat, such air, so damp and thick

I must grow gills to breathe.

Driving into dusk and sudden dark :

thunderheads mass as neon flares,

forked lightning strobes the sky.

Sleepless, I ride air conditioned drone

just like my ten hour flight :

my body says it's breakfast time —

here it's still the middle of the night.

As light begins to fill this motel room,

I watch dawn break across an alien land :

strange trees; buildings, unrecognizable

from shadows I first knew, disclose

themselves in startling shapes and hues.

And, through a veil of tiredness it's plain

that I have travelled all those miles

to find a truth already known :

what I love and really care for

I have left in England's home.

Florida, USA

ISAAC in AUGUST

A grandson and a hurricane.

Landfall first witnessed

by those at Frimley Park.

Finding his voice,

a Hanworth roof was raised.

Taking a month,

he gathered force at sea.

Touched down in Louisiana,

lashed New Orleans,

made TV and the morning news.

He was no Katrina,

but certainly all male.

Happy eighth Birthday, ISAAC !!

AFTER THE FALL

Corpocracy’s graffitied world

(where everyone is ruled by screens) —

built from our cheerless yesterdays

when troglodytes raged at machines.

Trying to change our point of view

we had to turn the ‘scope around,

abandon dogma, party line

and look across to higher ground.

But will the coming dawn reveal

incumbents who will ride roughshod

across the afterwards we’d planned,

grinding to dust our household gods?

How dark would be our future then? —

Books to the fire or left unread,

computers would produce all art —

a place where angels fear to tread.

ARUM MACULATUM

A flasher's in the undergrowth!

From cowl-like spathe, a spandix looms:

poker-shaped, purple and erect.

This plant's strange notoriety

relates to how it looks in Spring —

its bearing's spawned some bawdy names

like Adam and Eve, Cows and Bulls

Jack in the Pulpit, Naked Boys.

Its common name of Cuckoo Pint

sounds innocent but it's not right

as “Pint” should really rhyme with “mint”…

Priest's Pintle tells a different tale.

This plant has got a hundred names

and folklore's built up down the years:

some gullible young country girls

believed that just to touch a leaf

would make them pregnant overnight.

Well known for its toxicity,

in Tudor times the plant was used

by washer-women starching ruffs,

their burnt and blistered hands confirmed

the harmful nature of Starch Root.

By Autumn how the Arum's changed:

died back, green cowl and arrow leaves,

now plant appears as Naked Girls —

brazen and pale, ringed with bright beads...

These berries send to A & E

more casualties than other plants...

Most dangerous, the Cuckoo Pint.

TRISTRAM and ISEULT

How will you know me when I’m far away?

In the voice of the blackbird, in the first light of day.

My hands wave unseen in the shimmering leaves

But I’ll whisper, “I love you,” on the breath of a breeze.

Remember my essence in the scent of a rose

As you feel my touch where the cool waters close.

Picture my smile in the warm ember’s glow

And soon I will greet you with the kiss of the snow.

LATE AUGUST

Fat blackberries had caught the starlings’ eyes

And soon the walls and cars bore purple stains;

Dark elderberries, hung beneath clear skies,

Will swell with night-time’s gentle showers of rain.

The combines are out harvesting the fields –

A golden stubble greets the setting sun;

The farmer is delighted with his yield,

Returning geese are pleased when job is done.

First windfalls in the grass beneath mossed trees

As hazelnuts are plumping on the bough;

While on the quiet air the drone of bees

And, in the distance, gently lowing cows.

These are the sights and sounds that end this day –

With season’s fullness, August slips away.

Falmouth sunset... 

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