Still Waters

A Tacit Understanding

It is with a tacit understanding
of every passing moment freshly formed
and giving way in its turn to the next,
then neatly folding its form to the past –
that I observe that leaf, torn from a tree,
lying awkwardly against the dark soil,
as a small child kicks a ball to the sky.
Then the sudden rushing of wind gives voice
to the canopy of green ­– soon hushed,
then calm, as though the unseeable wind
had never been – then the trees quieting
to a warm murmuring tone and then on
to a barely perceptible whisper.
Below, traceries of shadow count time
in undulating seas of liquid green.

It seems to me on a summers day such as this –
as a mother sits cross-legged on turf fresh cut,
sharing some whispered game with her child,
and teenage girls sit chatting drinks from cans –
ever thus… yet never to be again.
Not in this exact conundrum of thought
that brings me to this new-made point in time,
rough-cut from years and days that make up now.

There may be many other days like these
as there have been many such in the past,
but not of this essence – this very point
of motionless stasis in forward flow.
Then the fixed points of known understanding,
relationships, people playing their part.
Like guy ropes stretching taught the canvas,
or stone buttresses levering the strain,
checking the bulk of some great edifice.
All these things pivot the balance and flow,
giving meaning and structure and form.

And as the child holds tight her mothers hand
and with small steps heads home – perhaps for tea,
the moment’s broken and I pray it’s thus –
that love and fondness lead to forgiveness
and all will be as it once used to be.
The wind gathers pace – defiles the moment,
stirring afresh the configuration,
from what is now... to what must surely be.