A WINTER NIGHT

 

No photograph for this, I'm afraid, so I've used a woodcut by one of my favourite wildlife artists, Andrew Waddington. You can find out more about his work here: http://www.andrewwaddington.co.uk

 



A Winter Night

 

The crescent cradle of the new-born moon

Hangs low amongst surrounding stars

In a bell-clear, iron winter sky,

Illuminating, fitfully and with pale half-light,

The frozen, snow-clad shadowlands

Of hedge and field and tree.

Under the protection of ice-dusted ivy

That thickly masks old, crumbling walls,

A muffled blackbird sleeps alone

With feathers fluffed against the cold.

No breathe of wind disturbs the sparkling blanket

That covers every branch and twig

Of dormant willow, sycamore and oak.

Nor does man or beast disturb the stillness

Except, in passing, one indignant owl

Whose cries complain at the fruitlessness

Of foraging in a bare and icy larder.

It seems as if the earth itself is fresh and clean,

Newly-made and not yet totally complete.

This is what it would be like

If the long-forgotten pureness of spirit

And peaceful sanctuary stillness

That used to dwell in what men called their souls

Could be turned into a world.

And if the heavens were as still,

And time itself was frozen like the land,

This is what it would be like forever.

THE BROKEN WILLOW

 

 

 

The Broken Willow

 

Beware! For I am the wild East Wind,

Terrible, indeed, in the power I can wield.

Back in the icy tundra I was born

And grew in fury as I crossed the frozen wastes,

Picking up, along the way,

Innumerable whisperings and murmurings,

And learning secrets only ever spoken to the wind.

 
It was I who, in years before your time,

Brought to this shore the cruel dragon prows

And, with them, terror, pain and death.

But, in truth, I have no need of other agents,

For I have the power, myself, to initiate

Bitter destruction in my wake.

Those who boldly fish the sea

In boats of fragile planks of wood,

Know me and fear for their lives

For, at a whim, I summon up the waves

And send their bodies

Rolling, lifeless, to the shore.

 
Only The Stone can stand against me

As together we create a song

In which my icy breath

Plays upon the ancient edifice

Strange, arcane and prehistoric tunes;

A rare glissando of rising, held, and falling notes,

Bizarre, lost scales of random accidentals

And not-quite sharps and flats,

Just as I have played the stones for centuries.

Few people comprehend the sound,

But some still feel, inside, a restlessness of spirit

That, day or night, will take them out

To walk, unreconciled, on hillside, cliff

Or wave-beleaguered shore,

Where canny seabirds, free-spirits of the air,

Dance to the tune upon my prancing back.

 
Yet you, a fragile, shaking willow,

Think that you can stand against me.

Beware! For I will twist your limbs unmercifully

Upon the rack of your own making,

Far beyond the point you can endure.

Beware! I say, for I can break you,

And I will……

 

MILLINGTON WOOD IN WINTER

 

Millington Wood in Winter

 

Pale winter sucks the colour from the landscape

As if the earth’s own life-blood has been drained away,

Leaving the recumbent, rolling giant of the hills

In somnolent, semi-conscious immobility.

The weak and wanly-shining sun,

Whenever it might deign to show its sullen face

From behind the lace of curtain-clouds,

Discloses secret folds and long-forgotten barrows,

Otherwise unseen when lit by harsher rays.

 

But in the wood, a new and startling sight prevails,

For leafless trees allow the light to permeate unchecked,

Disclosing an exuberant display of tantalising tones.

Here colours that seemed subdued in summer

Stand out in sudden contrast to the subtler shades.

Bright-green socks of moss adorn the feet of ash and beech,

And from a living trunk, rich chestnut-coloured fungi sprout,

Nourished in the furrowed bark.

Then, over all, a solitary blackbird’s call

Spreads a thinly-beaten, shining silver sheet of sound,

Unmuffled, now, by dampening leaves.