Summer Solstice

In June or July 2013 there was a short spell of quintessential summer weather which made me want to write a Shakespearian sonnet. It turned out rather Shakespearian in content as well as form.

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These sixty years and more I’ve gone about   
And gone about, sweating in the world’s show,   
Leeching cash and status like a glib tout, 
Grossly fawning then swapping blow for blow.

But now, body and soul-sore in my fall,    

The many splendours of the sun’s bold creatures
And the white moon’s sky-wide violet pall
Torment me in sessions as my impeachers. 

For the high solstice shuns all grubbing tasks

And lifelong misdirection’s no defence;
The pranking cranesbill flaps its glossy masks
And the cuckoo’s trickled song drenches sense:

Too late, indentures in this great assay I’ve had to prove,    

For now my summer’s lease is done and I must soon remove.

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© July 2013

Months: Lyrics: May

The poems for March and April in this series were posted on 14 March and 13 April 2015.
   Note: "Noah's splash" in the first stanza is a reference to the old adage "ash before oak we shall have a soak, oak before ash we shall have a splash." I wrote a poem about it - 'Adage' posted on 31 March 2012.
   Stare, throstle and wind-fanner are traditional names for the starling, thrush and kestrel.

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The trees are leaved; even the ash
Its many-fingered crown has dressed;    
      Noah’s splash
Must bide a year. With tipsy cheer  
The lopside stare at the bank’s crest     
      Whistles a leer.      

Crazyhead oak with fat-leaf veils

Enswathes itself, aglim with sun;    
      In shadows, snails
Aboard the nettles’ spiteful bristles, 
Thrush-grabbed are cracked to death among 
      The throstle jostled thistles.  

The splay-pined larch drops seed from cones

To fruit in the earth’s spicy pall;    
      With tortured bones,
Christ ascended in His blood’s banner,
Hovers; will He in judgement fall      
      Like the wind-fanner?

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© May 2014