I half woke to her rhythm increasingly strong
A pounding in the distance and a presence very wrong
Then I recognised the noise of the galloping hooves
I feared for my soul but my body wouldn't move
She came with a bound over moors, over gorse
It was the night the sheep learned that the Devil has a horse
Half asleep half awake I was locked in a transition
Of hynopompic trance with a black satin apparition
Her mane was all dressed in a web of darkling stars her
Black hooves set with ragged bloodtipped barbs
She neighed and threw a shockwave like a blast of shuddering thunder
That could knock you down before her malice ploughs you under
He'd left his abode so she didn't come alone
And the sudden chill was cutting to the bone
Her rider pulled the rein in his black gloved hands
She turned and bared her teeth and I saw that they were fangs
But before she could gallop back home in Hell's direction
The rider gave a glare and shot me a question
"You can see me!" he exclaimed,  "What substance are you on?"
"Cheese," I said, "so ** you and the horse you just rode in on."

Bird of thunder
Dark against the ochre light
Held briefly by the vortex
Snapshot of flight
Bird of thunder
In the glowering sky while
Below the Corn Wolf
Ripples the rye
And the breeze picks up
Rustles the leaves
Silvers the grass
And whips through the trees
Bird of thunder
Wings spread wide
You tilt away
And darkly glide
Out of mortal view
Return
To your master's wrist
In another world.

Flurries have settled
Lurkers leave fading treads
And behind locked doors
They watch in the warmth
And the crew have gone
Where the bitter wind blows
While the silent deadringer
Waits in the snow.

Whatever usually paints the sky
Had a change that day and used pastel
Swept a magnum opus of nacreous cloud above
Peonies crisping their petals down to dust
The poppy heads were green and bulbous and
Rowans drooped heavy with orange berries
Holly blue butterflies hung on the burnet
And when the night came to take you
A noctilucent tracery, ephemeral but bright
Sat low in the north, a web of veil that
Wove your shroud in the hot summer night.

I dreamed there were
Three new moons in the sky
It was calm.  It was dim
I was calling for him
A light that should not be lit was burning
The lilac was blooming
The seasons were turning
The shadows were deep in the shade of the porch and
Capella was pinned on the cape of the North
I grieved for him, I grieved for the spring
It was slipping away all entwined with
The trappings of grief and worry
The stonecrop leaves were thick and pink
And swollen taut like strings of berries
Deep was the silence and barely a breeze
The beech tree merely shivered its leaves
He filled my mind, my mind was his and
In the darkness the late spring slid
Into summer, a summer night's sleep
A season of waiting, a season of grief.

Odd coloured sunset, turquoise hued
Drains and darkens
Owl hurls a shadow across the tiles
And disappears behind the treeline
A vent steams.  The owl screams
And glides along the avenue
New sliver of moon sinks through cloud
Sickle that reaped the death of day
Sharp white wishbone of night
Slipping west, always west and
Finally dips out of sight
Its disappearance breaks the magic
Breathless moment
Transition
Silence wraps the linden trees
And high above these
Proud Capella is posing
And casting a spell to
Ward off the morning.

I am moving as a spirit.  I am rippling through the rye
I am hunting in the corn with malice in my eye
I run through the fields beneath a misty moon
And cavort in the corn amid the scent of elderbloom
I am stalking in the wind, I am weaving through the hedge
I come and go between the worlds and trot along the edge
I prowl through the darkness until the night withers
Now through the dappling leaves the first daylight dithers
The soft summer breeze ruffles through the thorns
And Venus sparkles brightly in the bezel of the dawn
I run beneath the chorus, the fluting whistle-trill
Of the long billed curlews as they wheel above the hills
A covey of grey partridge is stirring in the spurrey
They see the ripple in the corn and set up wings a-whirring
I skirt around the homesteads with their whimpering curs
And run under the lapwings circling over moors
I come again to cornfields sparkling with dew
The cornflowers opening to reveal their vibrant blue
The first blush of poppies is just starting to bleed
A wavering tide of scarlet along the edge of fields
The days they are longer and so the nights are short
While the moors are being gilded with bristling golden gorse
At the silent casting off of the deep blue night
The lapwings dart over me flashing black and white
And far above the brambles and the dog-rose bloom
The owls doze and dream and wait the day out for the moon
The brown soft-hued ducks and the bright gaudy drakes
Startle and take flight across the sedge-rimmed lake
They are not prey, I leap away over whispering rush-lined rills
That wriggle through the meadows and down the low-backed hills
Faintly growling, I am prowling, I am a mist of grace
Who has swirled for centuries and stalked about this place
Padding through both peace and war, rippling through both sun and storm
Hackling at those I see, yet few have seen my silver form
I run under the thorn trees that spring decked in white
My howl shivers the barley beneath the shortening nights
I run through the hedges that will yield the blue-black sloes
I leap with ease between the worlds.  At will I come and go
I hunt my prey through night and day, through the dusk and dawn
I am the ripple in the rye, the demon wolf of corn
The rattle of the lilac blooms rusting on the trees
Carries on the waves of the summer-scented breeze
I smell the bruised stalks of the purple creeping thyme
The undertones of yarrow and corn chamomile
As a fitful breeze veers towards me cool and fresh
I catch the unmistakable smell of human flesh
They go about their mortal world without a sense of fear
For ignorance is bliss - they do not know that I am here
Modern man has forgotten that I even exist
Only my victims see me form as silver mist
I do not need to eat - I am a spirit of the corn
But do not take me lightly, indeed, be warned
I can manifest at will and the breeze is my breath
And should I so desire my fangs will rend your flesh
In the barley and the wheat and the rye I am at home
Be mindful should you ever walk these fields alone
Ask yourself, if you ever catch my glinting eye
If it's really just a breeze that ripples through the rye.