#227 - the spirits of trees

 

the spirits of trees

let in a draft

 

in eyes no longer up

leaf tricks

just the one’s orchestral

 

imprisoned in everything we touch

 

less breath than all above

books and chairs and tables

 

(or fanfare for the common tree)

 

day whittled where

the instrument

some strung

some keys and stops

 

such as belong in the seasons

 

sniff at this next

whose (?)

and go on

 

pick up sticks

call kindling

of course it’s a game

surrender

 

have you been breezily some-when ?

much misted

in a cloud’s reach

under sun so

 

what wings thus spirited wing through?

 

much as are missing

with your any moon

 

walk with a stick of whom else?

cast spell about

 

hear all the parts

told in skies stood

who tells the rings?

who sees tree through?

 

time in each where we were then

 

when one falls

a house burns – widow maker

knock on the head

coy offering axe

 

in timber ironic

my chimneys then

conducting souls away

 

spirits of trees

inhabit creature

 

see standing wind bent till

come to the last of this kind

 

look down dizzy in the climb

I grew a tall breeze over the garden

take the vertical now

 

hands for a prayer

window for framing

these few steps through

a door to the open air

 

16.viii.20

227

two poems

 

a bit of both

 

more your mum than mine

but not

taunt together –

latchkey accusation

 

and powerless

second day of a dinner so to speak

 

here’s the house burning

just where we were

 

in the greyed out part of the screen

 

also it no longer is

 

new season ours

blew me away

as in an after war

 

make up what I won’t remember

connect it all grammatically

or make the reader work

with spelling – where’s that from?

 

a fragrant float

and I still have the clothes bag

put on the mother jumper

breathe

so many months since

 

useless as ever to ask

why do we speak of the dead?