Race Hill 1

In myth the raven has the edge

for deepest blackness.

But, stalking the winter rancid grass,

this lone crow`s so dark he shines and winks

like cut glass.

I`d like to think him handsome, but once,

new to the country and riding out alone,

I brushed close to a garrotted bird

hung by the neck from a thorn

to warn whole hungry flocks off the new-sown corn.

A yard`s too close for comfort now:

I`ll skirt the brute

and wait to hear him croak.

Race Hill 2

These broad green Sussex gallops are set

tilting on the Downs` edge

like the view from a tipsy plane.

I`m in my stride now, pushing up the rise

before the long descent.

Yet I`ll break the swing

to watch four racehorse colts

pick up hay and flirt, toss and plunge with it,

nipping and sidling in the neat paled paddock.

Here by the fence some small hand`s kissed

goodbye to a tiny glove as,

leaning from backpack or sling,

she craned at some small thing

her striding parents missed.

Sodden and striped, white drops still cling

to wool  fuzzy and harsh: it sets the teeth on edge.

I slip one patterned finger on a twig so slight

the wet weight sets it waving.

The Night Garden

In the night-garden all is secretive, enclosed, folded on itself.

Familiars of the morning - my cottage pinks and  melon hollyhocks - recede, all colour lost.

New shapes stand stiff and luminous.

Two hedgehog lavenders crouch beside a quilly porcupine;

geranium claws clutch from a silvered terracotta pot.

Selective light makes each white flower or glowing apple whole.

Light-leaved robinia illuminates the plot,

its fish-bone leaves` splayed  layers deep as a sea-bed charnel-house.

The longer view is lost,

and all is concentrated on this square of ground.

The weeping ash looms larger than by day,

takes dark hold and drips to the old brick path.

The playground of my garden intimates - the furry bees, the acrobatic birds -

takes its own form, and essence of summer night -

honeysuckle scent like ginger -  warms and permeates the skin

One sound - the opal toad`s soft plop into abrupt black water.

A Shelf for Honey

Searching one morning for a shelf to house

the first dark liquor from my Downland bees,

I remembered the picture I`d painted on board.

It slumped against the red-washed studio wall -

good, strong pine.

An urgent power filled me

of a raw domestic kind,

and grasping a sharp saw

I looked for one hard moment at the scene composed -

soft chosen blocks of colour worked on wood -

and sawed it clean in two.

Now one half - eggshell sky, some severed branches and a dove-grey hill -

holds my honey.

The other, moved from its first flat plane into the parallel,

I fill with crocks.

I like the cold, sharp break,

the scowl thrown at veneration

as the image snapped clean for kitchen use -

a plank smelling of sawdust.

That act felt final.

Still, another such as I might,

desperate for canvas,

turn out my precious honey pots,

run to her studio,

smear the board with paint.

Published in The Charleston Magazine  Issue 10  Aut/Win 1994