With stealth the darkness creeps
And seals the day
With hardly a difference of
Day from night;
Ink black rooks
From their roost
Take flight,
Circle, then return to the
Same bare branches
Silhouetted against
The soot grey sky;
Wintery sleet
Falls;
The cold seeps
Through every gap;
Even the log fire
Struggles in the grate;
There is no wind
Just empty blackness.
Hope, Light, Love and Rainbows
There’s always hope
If we’re brave enough to
Feel it;
Light if we open our eyes
To reveal it;
Love if we allow our hearts
To receive it
And tears
(enough to fill the sea)
To prove it.
Jewels in plenty to redeem
Life in all abundance awaits
But patience awards
Those who wisdom have
With knowledge that
We are not alone.
Together we press on.
Remembering the rainbow
In the sky.
A Winter Paradox
A latent sun
Which late had risen
Seeping through the mist
Dissipated and weak in appreciation
An embodiment
Of apologetic proportion
Lack lustre in warmth
Through which a murmuration
Of starlings flew
In laminar flow across
The far western sky
In mesmerising contorted pattern
Theatrical synchronisation
Above the Slapton Line.
I dream in silver
In monochrome
Winter depths
In haunting monotonous roar
Of the winter wind
I dream
Of the soughing trees
Their naked form
With fingered branches
Protesting as they are
Bent low
And rain hammers down
On iron clad ground
Like sparks from
The farrier’s steel
On anvil
Made as
Headlamps light
The dark road ahead
A sparkling thread
Perchance I dream
In silver.
Hoar Frost
Through feathered leaves,sutured needles,
Icy spines
Under the astral sky,
Dark fingers charm;
Crystals, thick which interlock,
Breathe superstition
Into the night of
Supersaturated air;
The silhouette is manifest;
It’s stature changed,
Transformed to supernatural
Spectral state.
Earth lays down her Mantle
Gripped within the jaws of bitter cold;
Betwixt the Equinox of Winter and of Spring;
When Earth her mantle,
In frozen form lays down
And leaden skies move across eastern soil ;
The wind,afresh, torments
The slender trees;
The door it rattles
And the signal comes;
Steeled ,the weathervane turns anew;
Precariously, it points to unknown sights
The garden,hauntingly now is stilled;
The high banks,protection graciously afford;
The earth awaits the snow that still may come
Reminding that winter’s chains are nailed and riven.
Under an English Sky
In laminar flow the colours,
Kaleidoscopic move
Across the moorland ridge;
Burnished bronze
And a torrid haze of straw
Unites with cooler greens
As the leaden clouds give way
To patches of powder blue
And the world really does
Awaken to the promise
Under an English Sky.
The difference of one Day
Beguiled by beauty
The transient winter’s morn
With hint of white streaked
Across a cyan sky
The palette of the hedgerow
Swapped for lichen covered
Moorland rocks
And sweeping views
Candescent rise
From aloft the mighty
Granite tors.
Air to breathe
The warmth of sun
Respite from rain.
Frost at Dawn
Uncertain,
That time between shaded
Dawn and morning,
Nature,
In frailty of perfection;
Earth lays down on frosted ground
Stillness and clarity
To seduce the mind
On distant views
Just out of bounds
Though view,restriction cannot hold
Unchained
It serves to sate the soul;
Transient it embraces
Ephemeral white and laced
Before transfigured it
Resumes its green stained hue.
Under a latent sun.
Lighthouse
The strength of the beam
Casts out darkness
25 miles the light is cast
Reassurance for those at sea
Enduring constancy for us at home.
Ruth Partridge 