The geraniums are in
And the logs are piled high,
The chestnuts are gathered
And across the grey sky
The wild ducks are flying
Away, away,
We’ll come back in springtime,
Some day, some day!
Tag Archives: nature
Cow Parsley
This year there is a
Splendid crop of cow parsley
In St Peter’s Valley.
I know you think it funny
That I should love this
Tall ungainly flower which
Grows head and leafy shoulders
Over scarlet campion
And ragged robin,
But its clouds of faded white
Are the saving grace
Of many a marshy field.
1968
Nightwatch
I love your warmth beside me as I lie
Cocooned in night, the small hours ebbing by,
Leaving me stranded like an errant whale,
High on a wide sandbank of sleeplessness,
A prey to fancies and imaginings.
No devils now, no banshee’s warning cries,
No terrors from a nun-conditioned childhood
Invade my thoughts and force their company,
But spirits of foreboding and of doubt,
Of melancholy and absurdity,
Hobgoblins all of chronic middle age!
You are my talisman against this night,
I stroke your thigh and put them all to flight!
20 January 1990
I have a homing instinct for the stars 
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