An earlier poem (written in July 1979) and based on close looking is "The Old Stone Wall, Honey-Red." I posted it on 25 April 2012 and it is linked here
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The pungent smell of opened earth,
Freshly turned and churned,
It stings the nose like smoke from the hearth
Or furzes newly burned.
Walking the railway path in autumn-tide
I found a fresh-dug hole some worm collector
Had turned in the damp black leafy loam banking
The path. That tart-aroma’d rotting, fecund
Of ooze and seep, trickled a sheen of wet
Which puddled the gouge. That reek, that sour and sweet
Unripeness, dank and tingling like an acid,
Yet hinted bitingly at a rich fulfilment
Next year in spring’s resistless bloating-forth.
All’s closing, crumpling; comes a sleep
Uneased, deprived, diseased:
Winter’s a time when the creatures weep,
Neeps with snow are fleeced.
Winds needle through the bare boles of frosted trees.
Climbing the combe, couch-grass beneath foot crunches
Like plastic sheeting. Clouds, leaden as gangrene,
Compress this cliffside gash, so that plant, creature,
Must starve in a freezing death-daze, grubbing shreds,
Day-long, within winter’s blackened, snow-smeared grip.
At combe’s top, smallholding man, denuded of work,
Stirs roots in his cookpot, brooding on his land-toil
Once earth’s year’s-end ice crust has thinned and split.
Water and chiffchaff prattle joyly –
Here’s cakes and mating, maidens!
What plant or creature foots it coyly
When sun’s restored their Edens?
As if a womb disgorged its groping bairns
A’sudden, spring’s a shouting, swollen fact;
There’s shoots, leaves, buds, all’s wetly warm, and lust
Of coupling frictions the agog woods and fields.
Already, thought of summer’s fleshpot months,
Of corn and beef, juices the mouth; and evenings,
Delighting in hum and stir, open like hands.
Hasten to live! gulping sun’s feeding, for soon
His prime’s decayed; autumn’s first leaf will fall.
Addendum
Winter’s a roar of gale and sodden snow,
Sobered, I question everything I know.
Then spring comes dancing with a primrose tint,
Its meaning’s hidden, readable as flint.
Through summer’s golden months the corn grows fat,
At last I found the truth, then smelt a rat.
And now in autumn’s damp and chill decay,
I mourn we live alone and end as clay.
====================
© October 2024
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The pungent smell of opened earth,
Freshly turned and churned,
It stings the nose like smoke from the hearth
Or furzes newly burned.
Walking the railway path in autumn-tide
I found a fresh-dug hole some worm collector
Had turned in the damp black leafy loam banking
The path. That tart-aroma’d rotting, fecund
Of ooze and seep, trickled a sheen of wet
Which puddled the gouge. That reek, that sour and sweet
Unripeness, dank and tingling like an acid,
Yet hinted bitingly at a rich fulfilment
Next year in spring’s resistless bloating-forth.
All’s closing, crumpling; comes a sleep
Uneased, deprived, diseased:
Winter’s a time when the creatures weep,
Neeps with snow are fleeced.
Winds needle through the bare boles of frosted trees.
Climbing the combe, couch-grass beneath foot crunches
Like plastic sheeting. Clouds, leaden as gangrene,
Compress this cliffside gash, so that plant, creature,
Must starve in a freezing death-daze, grubbing shreds,
Day-long, within winter’s blackened, snow-smeared grip.
At combe’s top, smallholding man, denuded of work,
Stirs roots in his cookpot, brooding on his land-toil
Once earth’s year’s-end ice crust has thinned and split.
Water and chiffchaff prattle joyly –
Here’s cakes and mating, maidens!
What plant or creature foots it coyly
When sun’s restored their Edens?
As if a womb disgorged its groping bairns
A’sudden, spring’s a shouting, swollen fact;
There’s shoots, leaves, buds, all’s wetly warm, and lust
Of coupling frictions the agog woods and fields.
Already, thought of summer’s fleshpot months,
Of corn and beef, juices the mouth; and evenings,
Delighting in hum and stir, open like hands.
Hasten to live! gulping sun’s feeding, for soon
His prime’s decayed; autumn’s first leaf will fall.
Addendum
Winter’s a roar of gale and sodden snow,
Sobered, I question everything I know.
Then spring comes dancing with a primrose tint,
Its meaning’s hidden, readable as flint.
Through summer’s golden months the corn grows fat,
At last I found the truth, then smelt a rat.
And now in autumn’s damp and chill decay,
I mourn we live alone and end as clay.
====================
© October 2024
