They seem to be lasting for longer each year, So long past September and into December – For even in frost and in sleet, they appear – Still shining in bloom on the thermal frontier.
And I have seen violets outlast their season, And snowdrops and hellebores turning up early doors. I wonder if climate change offers a reason ?, For something is urging these flowers and trees on.
The branches are bare, but the apples still mellow – We’ve bred them so hardy, it just makes them tardy. Surprises of colour make strange bedding-fellows, With the roses still red as the crocus bursts yellow.
I’ve always found the habit of naming flowers after the saints on whose feast day they bloom to be a shaky tradition in Europe, when one considers our pot-luck temperate maritime climate. Will there be an overnight host of golden St John’s wort on the 24th of June every year ? With our climate, the closest you can come is within a month. And of course, Easter brings its own complications.
Time to start the annual eyeing Of the final blooms in bloom, Before the Winter dying. Which will be the final womb ?
Ivy, maybe, maybe daisy, Roses far too slow and lazy To be done and gone by now. Asters equally as surly, Gorse that’s late and jasmine early, Petals braving frost somehow.
I guess they’re mainly cultivars, These freaks who just won’t quit, These suicidal stars – All for our benefit.
But perhaps there’s evolution here, With all the competition clear – The last shall be the first. Goldenrod and wintersweet Are hanging on so long, they meet The snowdrops when they burst.
Funny time, November, With the Autumn clinging on – Just like the leaves on still-green trees That won’t accept that Summer’s gone. But then, it does seem warmer Than the Autumns of my memory: Where are all the frosty mornings ? Bare-stemmed annuals ? Biting draughts ? Now the low-slung sun still shafts And won’t set Winter free.
It feels like this might last forever, And the freeze will never come. I love this strange, uncertain weather, When I should be grey and numb. And yet…I know this fulsome Fall Is from the carbon in the breeze – The holly shouldn’t get to grow so tall, Nor roses bloom so long. We can’t afford Novembers quite so strong, They even fool the trees.
Ordered by social convention into inaction, I sit at my desk and abstain – I keep my head down and stare at my pen till I hear The murmur of morning again. Like most, I start on my shutdown at ten-fifty-eight, And end at eleven-oh-four, To cover the randomly-synchronised watches of colleagues – And never mind minding the store.
Across the room, someone is typing. (Is that still allowed ?) Their rat-a-tat keystokes clatter. A phone rings out the alarm, which nobody answers, Till voicemail settles the matter. I ought to be thinking, I know, of tommies and trenches, Of birdsong, bombardements and screams – Instead, I just notice this shuffle’ing silence-by-rote – My thoughts are deserters, it seems.
The leaves are falling down again, They do so ev’ry year It doesn’t mean a thing to you and I. The days are full of wind and rain, But we are not, my dear – It is eternal Spring for you and I.
If trees have lost their beauty, Then I guess they felt the need, But we are still perennial and pure. And even if we’re fruity, Well, we sure ain’t gone to seed – We’re nothing like Autumnal, that’s for sure !
The leaves are falling down again, The boughs bear only rooks, Or else are torn and splintered by the storm. The frost may star the windowpane, The ice may sheet the brook, But we’ll just snuggle closer, safe and warm.
If days are getting shorter, Then our nights are getting longer, And the season’s chill is firmly kept outdoors. I don’t see why we oughta Be beholden – we are stronger Than the puny pull of Autumn’s metaphores.
Throat-wort over here and five-tongue over there, Clinging to the brickwork, When other weeds won’t dare. Any scrap of dirt will do, Waiting till the bulbs are through – And suddenly, they’re ev’rywhere, Ready with their reddy-blue.
Butterflies this side, bumblebees the other, Ferrying the love-notes, Each bloom to its lover. And then the scatter-seeds will blow, And where they land, so there they grow, As next Spring will uncover, By sprouting mauve and indigo.
Throat-wort is an old name for campanula (aka bellflower, but I always think of bellflowers as larger and grander). Five-tongue is a literal translation of Pentaglottis, the genus name of green alkanet. The truth is, I needed two-syllable names for both of them.
“And, behold…the earth did quake, and the rocks rent; And the graves were opened; and many bodies of the saints which slept arose, And came out of the graves after his resurrection, and went into the holy city, and appeared unto many.”
– Matthew 27:51-53
And the very earth shook beneath us, And the sky came dark and the veil of the temple was rent – As the Son at last came to leave us, So the tombs where slept the saints were breached as He went. And there they sat, arisen yet still, Since so long dead, they patiently waited For a night and a day and a night until On Sunday morn, they arrived belated. Zombies on the loose, they come ! Zombies in Jerusalum !
And yet not a word was spoken, As He was interred by Joseph of Arimathea, Of other tombs that were broken – For surely he witnessed the quaking’s rough aftermath here ? For there they sat, arisen yet still, Awaiting the one who had yet to be buried – So lay Him within the sepulchre’s chill And roll up the stone, his soul long ferried. Zombies yet procrastinate, Zombies lurk and zombies wait.
And lo, not a word was spoken By the Marys on Sunday making their way to His tomb, As they passed all the saints newly woken, As another earth-tremor gave sanction to auto-exhume. No more they sat – unprisoned, unstill – Now great was their stagg’ring and groaning as any – As stumbling and jerking, they lurched down the hill To Jerusalem, to the marvel of many. Zombies, rotten of complexion ! Zombies join the Resurrection !
And never a word was spoken By the Twelve at the Pentecost, just a few weeks on, With their tongue-gabbling voices choken – Yet never to ask where now had the dead all gone ? Where now they sat ? Or risen they still ? Where went their mission, so silent of news ? What is the purpose they mean to fulfil ? Is this what is meant by Wandering Jews ? Zombies, born again through Christ ! Zombies, torn from Paradise !
And still not a word is spoken, And the puzzling verse is never read out in church. No statue or stained-glass token Celebrate animate saints as they stumble and lurch. And those who are sat in the pews quite still And pretend that the verse is a metaphor or test – I guess they haven’t the need or the will To admit to themselves that it might be a jest. Zombies, clinging to their mask, Zombies, too afraid to ask.
Jesus ? My word ! Oh my lord, it’s the boss… Well, I never expected to see you today – Except maybe just hanging out up on your cross… Yet it’s funny, but when as a kid we would pray, And the Reverend Thomas instructed our eyes To be scrupe’lessly be tight and respectfully shut, Still I’d sneak them half-open and squint at your thighs, Half-expecting you’d come down a moment and strut. When there’s no-one to see, would you take-up the chance To relax and to stretch, and to smoke, and to dance ?- Till the words of the prayer were quite lost to my trance. Yet you never showed even the hint you’re alive, So you hung just the same when we sipped on your blood, And you looked down as glum when we learned of the Flood, And you seemed as remote when our prayer-books would thud, And we mumbled or massacred Hymn Forty-Five.
But anyway, never mind my reminiscence, Just how long’s it been since you came round my way ? For somehow you faded in slow evanescence, Your black and white certainties merging to grey. And old Reverend Thomas was no help explaining The problem of evil or problem of gays, And so finally, even my lifelong ingraining Could not keep the wonder or stem the malaise. But reading the papers, there’s plenty of good news – From leprosy vaccines to movies and blues, And there’s juries, and voting, and self-tapping screws – When abandoned, alone, we learned how to be great. I had waited and waited back there in your church For some word or some action to come from your perch, But unheard was my questions, and unseen my search – Until now, when I find you, I find you too late.
My poor, befuddled Easter cactus – Sometimes early, sometimes late, But never can it bloom in practice On the actual Easter date. We set a day for April Fools, We set a day to change our clocks But Easter follows loony rules: The first full-Moon from Equinox.
Early April’s worth a shout, I reckon, for a stable day – It’s warm enough for going out, And far enough from busy May. But all this shifty, ancient mess With sense as empty as the tomb, Is why my cactus cannot guess The week in which to bloom.
Rhyming Couplets 