Contemplate the rain, this fleeting season, changes I can do nothing about. Sitting, watching, listening; the hanging drops on vacant washing lines and leaves, all testimony to nature, that the laws of men may come and go, yet eternal truths stand starkly before us: Our choice to ignore. The harder I try the less I get in return. But the gentle rush of rain brings it back, the raucous calls of crows sitting in out in shedding trees; the clutter of my mind stands between what is me and my self.
In England the holiday season is all but over. It’s been short and difficult.
Now with autumn upon us, it’s hard to fathom out where this crazy year has been taking us and how fast it’s gone by — just as well, perhaps.
One of the things I have been musing upon is the name autumn, a borrowing from French, one of many thousands of French words in the English language. The older I get, the more I prefer the Stateside term ‘fall’, it is so much more expressive and, well, native.
Either way, it’s never been more important to get out and about in the fresh air when you can, especially on a glorious autumn, or fall, day.
Hope arrives at January’s
close, whether in presages
of spring or several feet of
snow. Right now with snowdrops
peeping, the increasing length
of day, it’s all palpable
at last. Then you call me your
rock – I’m very far from being that,
a mere
step, a name on some
useless bifurcation. Outside
it is twelve degrees; bring on
the west wind and
hope of spring
English: A male House Sparrow in Victoria, Australia in March 2008 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
The Sparrow
The sparrows are gone and now the winter is lonely.
Their spaces are taken by the gravelled drives
and the paved gardens. There will be no reprieve
but as the little bird leaves, like the wise man
deserts a fool, know that everything has its time
and that ours, too, is almost run.
*
The horse chestnut’s elephantine trunk glows warm
in the low winter sun, its clawing bareness stretches
into a cleansing sky. A narrow shaft of yellow light
dispels the rime on the whitened sward,
and the hanging orange globes of the passion flower,
like tiny suns, remind us of long gone warmth,
a hint of the approach of solstice day.
*
The lone robin stands guard, like a redcoat
patrolling his shed roof, punching way above his weight
to see off the bigger birds, those who would dare
plunder his own private space. He has nothing
but disdain for the squabbling starlings
who strut around in their shiny suits
in vain shows of bluster and pretence.
*
Even the cowslips thought it was spring.
Over keen, they showed their yellow hats
when the weather was mild and now they’re
caught out in a sudden arctic blast.
So too, the evergreen rosemary, whose lilac flowers,
though welcome, reveal the underlying unease
at the heart of the garden.
*
So we grew to like mowing the lawn, put up
with cutting the hedge. We let the poppies grow wild
and the elderflower rampage. We even learned
to love nettles and the funny little weeds –
but the sparrow never came back. They say he lives
in tiny enclaves now, in the fringes with red squirrels,
quite unknown in these parts, where the blackbird
chinks a meagre winter song.
Ciscography 