A new poem about the ash cloud
Five miles up, the hush and shoosh of ash,
yet the sky is as clean as a wiped slate-
I could write my childhood there. Selfish
to sit in this garden, listening to the past-
a gentleman bee wooing its flower, a lawnmower-
when grounded planes mean ruined plans, holidays
on hold, sore absences from weddings, funerals,
wingless commerce.
But Britain’s birds
sing in this spring, from Inverness to Liverpool,
from Crieff to Cardiff, Oxford, London Town,
Land’s End to John O’ Groats; the music silence summons,
that Shakespeare heard, Burns, Edward Thomas; briefly, us.
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