A Robin, sang by lamplight,
unperturbed by herald evening’s
gathering throng..
As if gloom could be dispersed
by an almost, fragrant burst
of poignant song.

The carriage clocks whirr
now the hour has spoken
it ceases to be..
Oh to placate those
untouchable hands
of fortune and destiny.

"...What other sound could be like this?

Which other note could trespass on
to where the likes of tears are formed?

What else speaks so well
of wilderness, of loneliness?

Which alternate voice could manifest
this desolate deliverance?

Such trifling themes as life and death
are kept in Curlew's calls..."

High on Tumuli,
Keeled in sways washed out from brazen oceans...

...the birds may have me now...

Prey!..strip this ageing skin, then take my eyes.

Let the Oort Cloud iris break upon
these lakes of trancing humour,
as Veronicas of astral grace
silk down the valley strides.

We drowned here today...

Sluiced along curious Holloways papered in shell.

We knew few colours by name,
Yet saw how they merged, circled, embraced,
to sweet-talk the senses to parley.

Last night the first Redwings sipped the late air
with the high-muffled chatter of Fieldfares passing.

Morning came garnished in far borrowed glories.

The place where we wonder to drown.

Toss these brackened antlers
to a Babylon of early crows
where slim repels of cirrus
lace the marches of Orion.
I wore you as an amulet
hard pressed upon my pestle arm
as charms of montane lunar drift
rebelled about your peacock gaze.

There is balsam on the Eastern run
in piquant writs of clementine ,
where jubilees of Persian mote
reveille in the waiting still.
As hieroglyphs of scrying palm
lay wraith about the cindered pane
you harried in ancestral bell..

The name of some forgotten God.

What is it she whispers?
Outside..
The brittle bleach decor rustles shy applause
Inside….
half encumbered slumber wins
The aching World to part made play
Arcadian chapels hover in folds
That form in the fields of gathering grey

and still she whispers.

Damp calico dales murmur and shift
in the twist of a tremor.
A cold palm press upon temples that pulse
for the touch of another that passes
high over the way…

What is it, she whispers?

Witch-fingers lift at the filigree latches,
saltwater patches salivate free…..
..lasciviously.
beneath the list of chalking blinds
rim- shot eyes scour windswept causeways

Always searching,

Always waiting,
For some unknown.

And still she whispers...

Evening cleats The Bay,

As cavalcades of passive argon, sulphur on
the ogham slicks,
to treacle ways toward the seeding
cooling of the hours,...

The sleights of crimson, fringe
the bruising cower of the West, to
brightly die behind the leathered hill.

From a wrist of tallowed amethyst,
a Tiercel purls a last ellipse, and in
his sinking helix ships, the Sommes
of curdled estuaries, to brood
the closing Mill....