New poem
*
Reaper in the Garden
Tasked to garner the cut grass,
I take down the blunt rusty scythe
hung behind the drain on the back wall
and, wetted by pear beer,
whistling over stony ground,
I toil under the sweltering sun,
the bearded chine a stork skull’s beak
mounted on a coarse-grained snath
lopping barbed false barley ears
and purple clover heads dried to dark blue;
like Oppy at Trinity,
‘I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds.’
The mown mow stacked against the fence,
I flag, salute a passing magpie;
Laura the collie rolls in the hay;
Death withdraws into the clouds,
pleased I shared his attributes for a while.
I close the black note book, pocket my pen;
caught you: reading over my shoulder.
*
New poem
*
The Coat
Seeing the showers start outside
in this unseasonable cold spell,
on the way out I grabbed my Barbour
– relic of my pretentious teens –
and hurried bare-headed through the rain;
the durable waterproofed waxed cloth
shedding water like off a duck’s back,
still unchanged, while I have changed so much
through heartbreak, childbirth, severance, divorce:
a good coat stays with you through the years.