THAT  ADLESTROP  MOMENT

Train stops.
Stranding us in real life countryside.

Townies gobsmacked.
Silence attacks.

The world melting
in a heat haze.

Where has our real
reality gone?

Tracks lead away from us
be we are going

nowhere
fast.

As if the future
had ceased to exist.

We are like the male member
caught in the teeth

of a too hastily
done-up zip.

Yep,,,,,,,doesn't go up!
Oooops,,,,doesn't go down!

A kestrel free
of our dilemma.

Laughs at us
"Humans, eh....who'd 'ave 'em!"

Smaller birds gossip
discussing this all too human

situation.

I recite Adlestrop
in my mind

to my reflection
staring dumbly back at me.

"There is a countryside
in my face..."

I Marvell.

As if Nature
had invaded my physiognomy .

"Unwontedly...something
something something or other."

Oh bother!

"No one left and no one came."
The birds stop to listen.

"Yes, we remember Adlestrop!"
they twitter.

"Hear it one day
in what you humans

call
the Past.

Wot a laugh!

They unaware that there is only
one great big forever."

I fell silent.
Deserted by all thought.

"Give us some more
of that good old Adlestrop stuff!

The birds chirrup.

"No what less still and lonely fair
through cloudlets in the sky."

I ventured.

"Naw...naw...naw mate!"
a crow caws.

"The bit 'bout us birds
if you please!"

I cough and continue.

"Farther and farther, all the birds
of Oxfordshire and Gloucestershire."

The birds all cheep and cheer.
"Hip hip hooray for Edward Thomas!"

The train remembers itself.
Rouses itself from its slumbers.

As if all this
had been but a dream.

"Yes, I remember Adlestrop"

But not all of it.

It was June.

Adlestrop
BY EDWARD THOMAS
Yes. I remember Adlestrop—
The name, because one afternoon
Of heat the express-train drew up there
Unwontedly. It was late June.

The steam hissed. Someone cleared his throat.
No one left and no one came
On the bare platform. What I saw
Was Adlestrop—only the name

And willows, willow-herb, and grass,
And meadowsweet, and haycocks dry,
No whit less still and lonely fair
Than the high cloudlets in the sky.

And for that minute a blackbird sang
Close by, and round him, mistier,
Farther and farther, all the birds
Of Oxfordshire and Gloucestershire.

It’s a trap
I fall unknowingly,
Unwontedly
It comes anytime
An emotional meltdown  
Suddenly I stop breathing
My hands freeze
Face turns hot
Like the blood is boiling
My legs trembling
I close my eyes
And the poison
It comes out in tears
A silent cry
Like an open tap
Like drops of rain
From a heavy tree
And everything freezes
I hear no sound but my heartbeat
I see nothing with my open eyes
All I feel is the wind
Blowing through my hair
The air stuck inside my chest
But I breathe
Slowly but surely
It’s suffocating
Yet I breathe
It’s heartbreaking
And I still breathe

Swan Song.
                                      
Mute swan flapping,
frantic skipping and
toe tapping, testing,
tasting, wind beneath
unfurling feathers.

Hitting, whipping, splashing,
hoping, others looking,
mocking, joking, out of
breath, choking, choking,
thought provoking.

Gagging, hissing, panting,
missing, escaping ?
not so easy, as lake waters
chop on each gigantic stroke.

Wet, then magnifies those
spanning tips, like downward
suction **** on lips or dipping
bows of steaming ships.

Resisting, persisting, aging,
fading, gravity engaging,
fearing, despairing, deciding,
gliding, no more nesting,
resting, unwontedly alone.