So much depends upon sky,
blue-mottled in fur muffs above
flooded fields awaiting dry
days that buffet thick winter mud
as it willfully clings
in hard lumps to all frozen ridges.
Spring's blow loosens clumps
to undo icy hold on shivering things.

So much relies upon wind,
pink-braided dawns fight cold's ache
as old nakedness withers
when warmth, in the wings, re-faces
bare twigs trembling nightly
by clothing in stages as buds open.  
Flora's warmth quietly          
dresses again what had lain frozen.

So much delights the seeing
eye as fresh life feels profound change
in new underneathness,
gripped-down grounded roots awaken
from sleep's hibernation,
while hunger for life drives movement.
As kind weather favours
much in nature depends on the sky.

Take one from a pair and trauma arises,
ocean buckles,
sunset ices,
waiting grows fists and memory sighs.

Take one from a duo and lost are smiles,
lonely ungloves,
solo resides,
life loses glitz and pleasure demises.

Take one from two and stress tightens
love uncouples,
oneness divides,
lips stay unkissed and pressure climbs.

Take one from other and spoil an item
parting troubles,
nothing revives,
grief's demand makes no compromises.

Pregnant with longing day's molten sky
displays first cloudlets skimming plains
and welcomes them into afternoon piles
of cotton-wool eiderdowns wet with rain.
Edging nearer they threaten to over-spill
drenching whatever is milling about and
waiting waterless at holes for their filling
of heavenly nectar as stomping, snorting
and squawking loudly, birds and animals
all faintly sway with great parching thirst.
This is the worst arid drought with relays
of rare newsworthy rain yet it can carry a
hope to each weak whining seared throat
as dust-scorched limbs move painfully to
view holes as edges between life or dying
of dehydration appear to grow broader by
every moment yet as jet cracks on horizon
nostrils flare and life in anticipation sighs.

Like a fish
in liquid my movement feels free
as I see our future being unaltered
I can taste possibility in each dawn
for love's immortality
I at last see.

Like a bee
rushing between sweet pollen sacks
on leaving a former grief constriction
I race to abandon my cell's addiction
after tasting abundance and shall
not turn back.

Like wax
softened near fire I, melting in thanks
remember the ties love burnt together,
days of perfection shall last forever
if the Heavens make nectar such
as we drank.

If through busyness there is no moment
to sit or stand
and look quietly at daffodils, spring will
have kissed its last,
summer's hot virility will have smothered
the countryside and still
not been wondered at by that too keen a
working-to-time keeper.
Months, if not looked at will rudely push
past each other
to attract attention and years may slip by
imperceptibly to
to disappear off the calendar into the past.

Clearly this calls
for deliberate action
by abandoning
chores, closing back
doors and
walking slowly into
morning's airy
feeling of fresh dew.


Sparing some moments to stop and just
stare will gift us
its own time-defying rewards by simply
enlarging joy
as it fills warmed hearts with lark-song.

If you think you saw
fair Queen Flora at work when you were out
walking and watched
her create hedgerow beauty, better not tell.

And if when you sat
in a woodland dell you caught the shadow of
fairy-queen Fey do not
go away feeling folk will believe you were not
just asleep and
dreaming of days when to you they were real
for humans who,
grown and work-overloaded will not lose face
by saying that fairies
exist or confess nature itself is assisted by the
ethereal people who
work for hours at night to open more flowers.

Oh yes, they smile
kindly when children spin fairyland tales and
stifle a chuckle as
youngsters talk about spells old minds do not
brook what life once
opened to those with an unconfused outlook,
toy teddies and dolls
could talk and witches flew broomsticks back
when knights and dragons
rode on clouds every night to battle for hands
of sleeping princesses,
everyday happenings were magical then but
things altered when
fancy's soft wings became crushed under the
banns put on speaking
of fairyland and beautiful Fey was cast away
to die with childhood
in the pile of discarded other-worldly beliefs.

Life must become realistic
and dreams are best forgotten as nonsense,
then hearts will harden
but poets refuse to abandon the child locked
inside so their eyes
still see what is to adults forbidden, romance
does not leave them so
prison doors never close on their imaginings,
kings go on living
in Camelot lands and maidens get rescued in
good time for love as
above every cloud there still sits silver lining.

There are grown-ups
who unlock their minds to see other realms
and child-like believe
but unless you are a poet if you catch an elf
unfurling red petals
from too tight a rose-bud or you see a fairy
painting blue on white
woodland bells, well, you had better not tell.

Voice of clear
melodious dalliance
comes trilling
this morning
from the throat
of blackbird's passing.

What distant
past ears ever heard
any better
composed medley
of unceasing ******
than from this ***** bird.

Filtering Spring
through bare boughs
as though now
was his own moment
the ****** rises as
loud crescendo bursts out.

Facing another
sun-full day the sound
wrings poetry from
feathered insistence and
cloudless his hope
of a mate being found.

Flying away
to some higher ground
he leaves me
feeling the song made
clear that "maleness"
would bring her around.