December 01, 2005

December Poem of the Month

in the bleak midwinter

watched
by the rich guarded
silence

of cotswold
farms

and a blinding sun
through bare trees

and the jagged saw
of a dog at the gate

i wonder
what my pilgrimage
to an indian summer
a half world distant
taught me

about this track
of unchanging england

wrapped up in compliments,
temporary as tinsel,
a feast that goes cold,
a santa that never
really delivers

as i slide

down my frozen hill
of ignorance

on slight city shoes
made in ahmednagar

towards a painful
wisdom

cranham, glos. dec 24 1994


Like Mocks, this is coming out in my new book at the end of March 2006. I hope all my readers have a blissfully happy and contented Christmas but if not, take solace in this throughly typical Western materialistic money-rich time-poor post-Christian let down. Give me Hardy's The Oxen any time...