Gold and silver battle *****
torn from swords saddles and crosses
lying beneath a farmer's field
tributes to kings and bellicose gods.

Fierce birds of prey snakes fish and bears
framed in filigree geometry
guarded warriors' savage souls.
No mercy in Mercia.

Archeologists anthropologists
historians librarians
curators and consertvators
collect confer and classify
while I just try to connect.

He placed wildflowers
    in her hair,**
             *for the last time

There's a lunatic in my mirror.

Someone's speaking in the kitchen,
though I know I'm on my own.
It's no ordinary sound of house.
We do not usually converse.
Its chatter is perverse,
so dialogue leads to friction,
when it nags me into cleaning,
while competing for attention
with the garden, growing, greening.
Like twins they twist my tolerance.

That speaker's spoiled my thinking,
so easy to displace,
but I'll stop his broadcast bleating
and tune to inner space.

As we approach time moves faster
her late gate pass wasting away
though we're running through the wet
and waltzing through the traffic spray.

Breathing heavily we arrive
weaving through the pairs of leaving
clustered lusting cuddling couples
whose ardour thrives a five to ten.

My girl guides us to the last tree.
We grin and grapple futilely.

Those sentry lamps that guard the path
a checkpoint no charlie shall pass
then knife-faced Nora rings the bell
consigning men to outer hell.

She's missing, they're sure of it now.
They thought it strange no one called,
not a word, not a sight, not a sound.
We fear for her, missing overnight.

They're searching, asking questions now.
Locals helping, no one sleeping.
No word yet, family weeping.
Headline news, tension rising.

It seems like a week has passed by.
Police announce an arrest,
unspoken ******* fears.
Volunteers asked to stand down.
Missing, she'll always be missing.