Walking through these sweet scented leaves
I know autumn has come.
A solitary bird
Sings somewhere in the cool air.
While outside these sheltering trees
Civilisation goes on
And a few solitary birds
Sing their song
Of empires long since gone.
When a churchyard tree
Dripped rain on me
I thought that I ought
Not to swear
For the rain will remain
When that tree
And me are where
We will know no rain.
Sitting on this fallen log
With my dog
Nearby, I touch the reality
Of this tree,
Which once stood
In this Great North Wood.
It’s brother trees still stand
Their canopy shading me
From the evening sun.
Others will come
And sit or stand
In this place
When this old fallen tree
And you who
Now read me
Have vanished without trace.
I open my window
And let in his cry
With the chill night air.
He is out there
Somewhere in the dark park,
Or the churchyard nearby.
I closed my
Window against the chill air.
He remained there,
(For how long I
Can not say).
Then his cry
Seemed to fade away.
I yawn
In the early morn.
A bark
Pierces the dark.
The carpet is warm
Against my bare
Feet. While out there
The fox’s word
Is heard
Ere I sleep.
| On leaving
The half-empty pub On a spring Evening, I heard birdsong. I love These chill Nights , when the trill Of birds is heard On the still Street. Their unconscious art Calls to my sad Glad heart. It was always so. And I know Their song will remain Until I gain The churchyard path Where all must pass.
|
I have awoken to birdsong
And lain awake
Until sleep takes me again.
I measure time
With clocks. Birds and flowers
No not hours,
Nor do they see me
Conversing with time
In a half rhyming rhyme
Until my song is done.
These trees
Speak to me
Of mortality.
Touching old bark
And cold gravestone,
I hark
To the birds
Still heard
By me.
I recall the nesting box
On my grandfather’s shed.
Blue Tits laid their eggs.
Some grew, and flew
Away.
January seems dead.
Yet, in the churchyard birds
Sing.
And, come the spring
Birds will lay in boxes
To the delight
Of young children.
And foxes bark
In the depths of night.
We may try to deny
That Mother Nature is there.
But the bur
On our clothes.
The prick of the rose.
And twigs in our hair.
Show what we know,
That nature is there.
K Morris - Poet 