This, that, then...

This walk,

up and over Bothen Hill,

is a favourite way

to make sense of the world;

let my feet find a rhythm

for the rest of me to follow.

That day

the wind was unsettling, creating

a swirl of emotions, inside:

uncertainty. And the certainty

that things were changing,

soon. The way home

was shadowed by dark

clouds gathering in the evening;

like crows and jackdaws

returning to roost.

Then,

unexpectedly,

the sun broke through.

Clear, golden light falling, 

like rain, over Colmer’s Hill,

and Bridport below,

illuminated

with rays 
of hope.

Hogchester Farm

We drifted down

Through the flower-folded meadow

Amongst a flotilla of brown-sailed butterflies

And a cavalry of tiny grasshoppers, clattering

Against the seed-cases of yellow rattle.                                      

Golden sunlight crowned the oaks in the hedgerows

And kissed the tops of feather-crested grasses.

That night, sleeping outside

Beside flickering firelight and

Ghostly moonlit foxgloves,

We were haunted by fleeting rain-sprites

and disembodied fox yelps

Disturbing the darkness.

I awoke beneath oaken arms:

The campfire still smouldering

With the smell of whisky and

Tender late-night conversation
Hanging heavy in the rain-thickened air.

It's May Day once more

It’s May Day once more

But no Morris dancing at dawn

Nor Mummers plays making merry

Around the town, throughout the day.

Last night, for once, for me

There was no late night

Drinking in the Woodman or the Royal Oak

Nor camping out in the woods

A stride away from the Giant

Astride his ancestral home on the hill

No gathering of morning-after mates

With bleary-eyed dawn choruses of

I like to rise when the sun, she rises.

Yet still we rise

My daughter and I

As the sun she rises

To climb the hill behind our house

Ready to greet the first summer’s day.

But the clouds are grey, and

It’s dark and dismal on the horizon

Where Eggardon Hill sits, brooding.

So we too sit, quietly

On a wooden stile near the Warren

More like evening mourners

Than May Day morn-ers

Drinking tea: me

And she: crunching on a Kit-kat.

Then there’s a break

In the clouds: a dazzle of dawn-light

Unexpectedly bright and golden

Undershot with pigments of pink

Our eyes are glittering

Our minds skittering, with sudden jolts of joy

It’s so special, she said, and I’m glad

You got out me of bed.

Whilst she was in bed

Last night, I was in Sadness Copse

A corpse of a wood, hanging on

To the side of Hyde Hill
An easily-reached refuge 
In difficult times

A place of least resistance

Amongst bracken and brambles

Nettles and pine-needles

And, strangely

A lone, long-stemmed cowslip.

Amidst surround-sound birdsong

I thought I heard a nightingale, calling

In the hawthorns and hazel bushes

Or perhaps, just the ghost of one I heard

This time, last year

In another place.

On the other side

Beyond the canopy of trees

In the shimmer of moon-shine

A blanket of bluebells is

Laid out across the grassy slope.

In the growing gloaming

They become luminous, blue-minous

Like little lanterns ignited by moonlight.

I linger a little longer

And it’s midnight before I’m home

Where in the blinking of two eyes

I’m waking my daughter, before dawn

And it’s May Day once more...