The walls stooped
Under the weight of age.
Windows frowned
From gables
Out towards
Wicked, old, Cleeve hill.
At the front, a cote,
Devoid of dove and egg,
Stood sentry and I, a child
Inside its bell,
Hushed by such anatomy,
Wondering at
The innards of the past.
In one barn, an old
Gig, crippled and wheelless
Carried no one to prayer now.
I remember
To the side, a pond,
Rich of reed and birds
Translating the summer
Into song.
Then recall
My father talking of the coracle
That used to teacup him to the
Other side
While older boys, in France now,
Not their village, left
Mothers for the mud.
All this memory arrives
In response to a photograph
Of my great aunt,
A thin-tendrilled beauty
In black velvet and fox fur
Walking up the drive
Into her widowhood.
https://wildcourt.co.uk/new-work/two-poems-by-bernard-pearson/
