Winter Trails

'Do you Know...' and Stay Winter

'Do You Know...'

Oh, and we must go again
on damp, shining roads,
sliding from track to track
to ease the slot of purposes,
trailing out spoor behind.

Indiscriminate that sun
and yet must fret about
the birches caging light,
on bonny, scrubby banks,

and finds us, strobes
through flicker-wicker
fast it so judders brain
me leaves and waiting
at a junction half insane

wondering who and where
I am or whether I can
drive and my way find
today and yet back

I come out of the blue
into the slate-cloud rack
heaping up for dusk,
buzzing, all lines
heavy with poetry.

...................................

Stay, Winter.

I won’t wish winter days away
took long enough to get here -
emptiness, familiar on the tongue
and to the touch. We’ve hardly felt
its grip as yet on these mild shores.
For most of us it’s still to snow.

The wet blows that let floods
wreck homes on plains and river drains
at least weren't icy. We’re not Quebec,
tormented six months. Though as north
as Baffin Bay, Sou’westerlies warm us,
North Atlantic Drift grazes these shores,
brimming with  gannets and sunfish,
blue-whales and porpoises.

January has been a toothless huntsman
these several years - March a mad thing
of blizzards. February always has had
evil fits and will yet.

But I fear April (run she will). This time
the blackbird might tear out my heart
with diamond knife not suture it.

..........................