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Dawn is early: the redbreast has shrilled his claim
Before men rise; later, the thrush’s evening
Ululation pierces the copper flame
Of sunset. Between, starlings are scavenging.
A
blue sky convects warmth through the chill air
But
soon, beetle-browed cloud like dusk, slings hailFrom a freezing wind, smashing petals, stripping bare
The tulips. A drenched leaf flaps like a sail.
The
exposed becomes covered. The dead-end nook
Piled
with bramble stalks, torn plastic, rotted wood,Is swamped by rhododendron – a closing book
Composting silence beneath its heavy hood.
Unstoppable,
growth multiplies; grass glistens
Under
sodden sunlight; grape hyacinthShake fists, crowded by nettles, dog parsley listens
For the bee, quailing at the sudden rain’s rinse.
Ah,
how the young relax! Their clenched shoulders
Of
winter expand, they laugh into each others’Eyes in a flurry of pairing. That which moulders
Is regenerate; the martin at its nest hovers.
There
are losses. A fluffed, sick sparrow huddled
Beneath
a hawthorn attracts a barrel-faced crow.Old men, surviving winter, shrunk and muddled,
Await their predator, whose knock they will know.
Undeterred,
magnolias like fireworks spume;
A
child exults, lord of both womb and tomb.
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© April 2012