It looked like summer’s end had come. The days Died younger, leaves curled, fruits hung heavily; The shadows lengthened in the holloways And plough and harrow worked on steadily. Our minds made space for thoughts of times ahead: Of wool and wood; of frost and fire and rain, All warmth stripped from the land, the sky like lead, The Hunter striding through the night again. Too soon, it seems. We hide indoors as heat Engulfs the gasping fields beneath a sun Like molten copper, torching our conceit That all past carelessness may be undone. And so we watch the world burn with our shame. No place to run. And no one else to blame.
Now comes the season when we lie Along the roadside, heaped up high In cardboard box and plastic crate That passers-by might deem our fate.
A few of us are smooth and firm Untouched by blackspot, wasp or worm; And take our places at the heart Of fruit-bowl, crumble, pie and tart.
But most are doomed to be discarded Brown and rotting, rank, regarded With contempt; no one will taste Their sweetness. All are gone to waste.
One tree gives life and strength to all Yet chance determines where we fall. And if our landing should prove hard What hope for us left bruised and scarred?
The wind blows keenly now and shakes The branches roughly. All it takes Is one untimely storm or frost And every one of us is lost.
So. Summer reaches out a fiery hand. She takes the crown from Winter’s hoary head And wears it now in splendour, with the sky Her banner raised in triumph, all the green And smiling land her realm. We waited long For this, the greatest glory of her reign.
Those iron months of cold and endless rain When gleeful frosts nipped any careless hand And feet and clothes were never dry – all long Forgotten and forgiven as we head Where ancient stones stand in their sea of green And turn our faces to the dawn-grey sky.
And now light spreads across the eastern sky As Sól gives Arvak and Alsvir full rein. Long slabs of shadow swing across the green Beneath our feet. We reach a hand Towards the gold horizon, let our head Be filled with dreams and wishes held so long.
And who would blame us if we said we long For this to last forever: that the sky Might never turn to ashes overhead; No battlements of clouds raised, dark with rain No flake of snow upon an outstretched hand Or end to this sweet world of lustrous green.
Yet even as we gaze upon the green Soft-shining land where meadow grass grows long Awaiting now the skilled and eager hand That cuts the hay, we glance up at the sky And mourn the dwindling days of Summer’s reign Her slow decline and death that lie ahead.
Then let each leaf and grain and flowerhead Each tree and pasture clothed in gleaming green Be now to us a charm against the rain And storm to come. For it will not be long Before the night returns, reclaims the sky And we are gripped by Winter’s cruel hand.
We cannot stop the rain. What lies ahead Lies in some other hand. Yet hope is green And lingers long, however dark the sky.
I’ve been meaning to write an aestival follow-up to my first sestina, Midwinter for a long time, and finally got round to it yesterday. The sestina is a challenging form that requires a long run-up, hence the 12-year interval, and the fact that even then I’ve posted this a day late! Solstice is, of course, an ancient pagan rite, so I added some standing stones, and borrowed Arvak and Alsvir, the horses who drew the chariot of Sol, the sun goddess, across the sky, from Norse mythology.
I watched you while the winter traced your trees In crow-black ink against a sullen sky. In bitter cold you hardened by degrees Then lay so wet we thought you’d never dry. Long lifeless months you languished, empty, stilled, In silence for a season, till it seemed Improbable that you had ever lived, or filled The great barns with your bounty. Had I dreamed Those endless, sun-washed days? No. For I see The life force rising in you hour by hour: The bluebell, celandine, anemone And cherry blossom heralding your power. And so it goes. The great wheel of the earth Turns under us, from death to this rebirth.
Spring comes to Sussex at last. About time too – but all the sweeter after what seems to have been an unfathomably long and dreary winter. So today I’ve no politics, protest or polemics: just a simple, grateful sonnet for the season, and where I’m lucky enough to watch it bloom.
The book I’d like to read has not been written; The tune I want to hear has not been played. No painting is precisely as I’d wish it; My perfect movie is, as yet, unmade. What song would soothe my ear now, there’s no telling; No architect’s creation holds my gaze; I fear my feet would find no fun in dancing; No appetite for even Shakespeare’s plays. And what of my own kindred: do the poets Have powers to aid me in these fevered times? Perhaps I might discover some great secret Concealed in their cadences and rhymes. For poets speak of love and truth and beauty; Show us a new and grand reality. A vision of a world unspoiled, unburdened; Not as it is, but as it ought to be. And yet I see no promise of redemption: All things are tainted by the touch of hands Intent on harm and hurt; no thought of making But only breaking, ruining our lands. And there’s no comfort in the old religions No hope in our so-called democracy: And even at the bottom of a bottle There’s no long-term solution I can see. So I will go out early in the morning Ride through the country, where I hope to find A truth no human art has yet imparted To my world-weary heart and troubled mind.
These are my terms. I am. Have always been. Foundation of all things; bones of the earth. No number for the ages I have seen; To ancient fires and ice I owe my birth. I suffer you to stumble up my slopes To brave my bogs and burns, my sudden squalls. I will indulge the crampons, axes, ropes With which you arm yourself to storm my walls.
But I will not assist or lend you aid When storm clouds break upon you and the snow Screams in. You own the choices you have made; I stand impartial, neither friend nor foe. And when the wind and wet conspire to tear Your trembling fingers from their fragile hold I do not weep, rejoice, laugh or despair; Dispassionate, I watch events unfold.
And should you overcome all things, succeed And stand upon my peak in victory I offer no opinion on the deed: Your gain and loss are all the same to me. I have no truth, no answers. You will find Them in yourself alone. I am the place Where you may dare the darkness in your mind And meet your strengths and frailties face to face.
All things must pass; and yet I shall endure. The world may change, but I will always be. When doubt and chaos reign, I still stand sure. When truth is hard to find, remember me.
For Burns Night: inspired by our trip to the Scottish Highlands last year. Scotland’s mountains aren’t high by world standards but they’re rugged, remote and can be tricky to navigate; combine that with their notoriously fickle, often brutal weather and they’re definitely not to be trifled with. The image shows Ben Loyal, a magnificent Munro in the far north: the title is Scots Gaelic for ‘the great mountain’.
By field and farmyard
Shaw, copse and spinney
Bridleway and holloway
I am Fox.
By garden and playground
Twitten and cul-de-sac
Bypass and underpass
I am Fox.
By seeking and scavenging
Raiding and thieving
Nourished and famished
I am Fox.
By swiftness and subtlety
Stealthy and shadowy
Running and cunning
I am Fox.
By covert and country
Hounds, horn and hunters
Followed and swallowed
I am Fox.
By midnight and daylight
Highways and byways
Glances and chances
I am Fox.
By legend and fable
Knowledge and hearsay
Neighbour and stranger
I am Fox.
By adapting and enduring
Shifting and drifting
Thriving and surviving
I am Fox.
My father mentioned once, apropos of nothing, that in this place he’d lived in thirty years this view was his favourite.
Over the churchyard wall across five miles of fields and hedges trees so dense no house or road breaks in and ending in a high green hill its slopes soft now but ever scarred by centuries of working.
And still, we never sat, we two on this old weathered bench warmed by an autumn sun and gazed on it together. And now, I think, perhaps we never will.
Gonecycling (again) 