The tyrannic moan of the refuse truck;
the granite of the rook's caw,

the windows suffer under sleet.

The street is lighted yellow ;
for the survivors, the last ones.

Your breath is soft beside me,
each pause fills the darkness.

Dream I am better than I am,
the night's follower, the undecided.

Chinese toothed, slack chinned,
concerned at the inrunning cold
you flood the snowed path with light

like a stage. Your singular silence
incomprehensible for the coated shape
one known, now a smile of wire.

The years, like snow,clean the slate.

When the early mist
rolls down the Inntal
                   and tired rain
                   hits the early window

and speaks in a broken voice,
splashes like tyres on tarmac

your small engine of breath
strectches under trapped linen
                  you are closed
                  and distant.

Late Autumn. Time for frost.

Anklecut but running;
cornchildren at break,
dust and more dust.

Flight the cutting
of a lost sanctuary,
legless with shock

at life turned upside.
Stubble the blunt cut,
the wait of the expectant
loam, under the farrow.

angular,
behind black,
a suggestion of brick;

the spire moon
shadows the roots
under stars,

slight warmth
of sandstone
and ticking birds,

small movements
between gravestones
and curled brass

a dark box
of stone waiting
for the edge of light

( for Seamus Heaney)

as if the pale stones
share the warmth
between two sides
sea and field cut
early light and fallen morning
the path weathered and slow.

Early darkness; as oil we drip
Through the heart's engine,
In black; lemon- faced we
               shadow the next.

We hesitate with tears and
Stutter over earth; arms linked,
              distant and cool

To scare a circle of crows
And a falling steeple; music and
Words that break the shocked ring,
             for that is all.