solemn quiet days of rain
percolate peace into my bones
and makes the world a gentler place to be
everything stops to listen
trees and sodden hedgerows
gables porches and stoops
passing cars will slow in reverence to the call
listen
listen
and for a time there is nothing else to do but that
to listen
to fold back into the memories of who we are
open our culverts and let the clutter drain away

silent in our country cage
the tourist moths have come to gawp
bruising their bodies against the gauze
of this night time zoo
free to those who brave the dark
and dance with the moon

we are our purest voice
when light first hits our face
and we tell the world who we are
without thought or knowing

but soon the galloping tide of words
flood our virgin sands
and we are laden with expectations 
that build new walkways we so confidently stride out on

yet do we ever learn to talk
buried as it now is
under glassy temples and featureless waves
our first and purest voice?

I saw a Kildeer today
unnaturally placed amongst the traffic and paving
skittering over a short grassy knoll
towards sanctuary in some riverside reeds

had it been blown off course
away from the pebbles and slap of the sea
from the other Plovers and their insistent chat
about the one they had lost

snow clothed the naked forest
but a dram or two
helped melt new paths
to possible re-imaginings
of a latent life

we heal and settle
in the gift of solitude
and the ancient wisdom
of our arboreal kin
steadfast, cloaked, secure

the gull hangs in languid pause
riding the grey wind 
above greyer fretted waters
not a care for the storm
that flails at flesh

immune with envy
inquisitor of the sea
his voice lives among the whispering rocks
notes of brine rising to speak
at the shudder of each tide

you sit beside me
my benevolent nostalgic friend
with an arm around the bag
I have my keepsakes in

you are warm
a breath from the hearth
keeping close the road
to soft rain for a lost past

the cold has drifted in
settling a piercing quiet
over the bare turned field
with a keen and muted air

season worn clods rise in crumpled rows
turned by the fall of the blade
their heady fragrance
sealed within frosty coats

and in the lowered copse
a twist of naked limbs
with ambitions for the sky
are asleep to my presence

still, as I walk amongst them
a chorus from their remnant flesh
chilled and crisped
murmuring at my feet

there is comfort in this path
that leads to long known havens
comforts that cannot be aged
though our many winters may try