Thursday 15 September 2011

Gale

I’d share that moment with you if I could;
the morning sun straining through scudding cloud,
swathing the wind-scoured fields in shifting light.
And yet for all her wintery glory bright
The trees and scrawny bushes bowed
Not to her, but to another.

A gale swept in, swept clean across the coast.
And from my armchair, safe, I sensed its power
in throaty gusts that made the rafters groan
and toppled heavy plant pots – left them prone
and helpless, ‘mid spilt earth and flower.
Their squat stability undone.

The skeletons of climbing frame and swing
Keened, as raw elemental air raced through;
shuddering with the strain of staying still.
The lengthening grass preferred to bend, its will
less hardened; rippling like the blue
green sea that swells beyond the dunes.

Strangely moved, I sat transfixed and silent,
breathing shallow lest the spell be broken.
Embraced in peace, when outside all was rage
I lost myself in wonder for an age,
knowing truth was being spoken
in words no ear could understand,

but heart could fathom. The unrepentant
wind was chiding; calling all who live too tame
to wildness. Not to shush the soul’s long sighs
to sleep, but send them skirling through the skies,
airborne, breath-born. Given a name.
Lifted, like a child’s giddy kite.

I’d share that moment with you, but it’s gone.
Swept off on that same breeze to who knows where.
Yet traces linger; a yearning for more
of all that we call life. I slid the door
and stepped into the swirling air
where dry leaves danced in ecstasy.

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