Angle-Shades

Angle-Shades

 

A foot-scraper sidles up the wall

like a basking lizard catching

a sideways glint of winter sun.

 

Grave-shadows cross the grass

at an enhanced slant, like

a grove of granite sundials.

 

Some touch the paving stones

as though thumbing the keys

of a moss-cold accordion.

 

Wrought-iron cages a grave,

a long-barred prison holding

ghosts down to the turf.

 

A house is engulfed by sun;

its chimney is the drip-end

of a funnel, spilling dew.

 

The yew tree reaches loving arms

over the mourners’ chair, offering

a cool-breathed consolation.

 

Dark as water, flooding the west,

spilt in a rush, engulfing

a hedge, the church pours down.

 

There is a confusion of graves

and trees; we walk through woods

on the recumbent plane, come out

 

at a gate, leading nowhere and

everywhere. Creak it open,

bow low, enter the sunless ground.

 

Poem by Giles Watson, 2013.

 

Done