1309
Poems from Norway
All at sea
Here we be
And both agree
This G&T
In the Observatory
Is necessary
To set me free
From the purgatory
Of my workaday
Consultancy.
Brian Hick autumn 2013 On a Fred Olsen cruise to Norway
©copyright Sally Hick 16.1024
1225
I don't want to believe your miracles.
I can't accept you healed the sick and blind
But take no action in our fractured world
To halt the massacres which plague mankind.
I don't want to believe you raised the dead
Or met the prophets in a hail of light
When faith is an excuse for mutilation
And every preacher knows that he is right.
So why my hesitation, why the instinct
To pause, before I rush out to condemn
The simple and misguided who would follow
Anyone who seeks to flatter them?
Perhaps I sense your smile behind the haze
Which seems to complicate my rational ways.
Brian Hick November 2012
©copyright Sally Hick 14.10.24
1223
Are silkworms peculiarly thick?
They move with impenetrable slowness
Eat nothing but mulberry leaves
And then get boiled alive.
So that 0.1% can wear their silk.
In the Hayward Gallery one whole room
Is full of rocks and chains
Carefully covered in live cocoons
Close by, trays of silkworms munch
Their way through piles of leaves
Never thinking to aim towards the edge
Jump over and deny us what they spin.
Have we bred them into indolence
Or did we first avail ourselves
Because they were so lazy?
Brian Hick October 2012
©copyright Sally Hick 8.10.24
Larks above the Mist (part 5)
My way runs through a beech wood where the trunks
Stand like the ritual way, leading me
Down naves of skybound columns, canopied
In shimmering gold, entwined with ivy polished
And patterned like the snaking armlets, cast
Cut and burnished for the goddess' praise.
As stars appear and the new moon rises
I set a bothy for the long night's rest
Stacking branches and the lying moss
To keep the wind from chilling me too far,
Warm beneath the wolf-skins and the furs
Of squirrel, ferret, weasel and black mole.
Day break, and the mist which lay unmoved
Has vanished, though the sky above's still grey
And the wind which dropped as the night fell
Cuts keenly as I break my fast, before
I start my last day towards the continuence
Of sacred streams and this long ridgeway path.
The country here is changed, the copses, filled
With fir and ash, darker and denser set
Between the open downs where herds still roam
Or race across the open headed moor.
A flurry of finches bobs from hedge to hedge
Keeping a gentle distance from my face.
Unseen above, thee larks seem to mock
A kite hovering, hungered after days
Of mist which kept him from his prey
Lurking, preening in the autumnal fields.
Two thousand starlings flow silent across
Then lift to murmur in the evening light.
A wood so full of rooks, the trees could be
Alive, but one by one they rise and circle
Silently until the sky is darkened
By their flight, and all the noise is stilled,
As they cloak the evening with their wings.
The pathway drops toward the valley floor
Where the river weirs and shallow runs
Allow a crossing even at full flood.
Epona, life of every stream
Pike & perch, trout and bream,
Sanctify our watery ways.
Here beside the shrine I break the axe,
Cast it in silence far across the flood
To vanish in the water's broken edge,
As if it had never been, and I
Who cast it, will as quickly disappear
To leave no trace .....
Epona, Goddess of the night
Moon and starry points of light
Sanctify the dark today.
Brian Hick October 2012
©copyright Sally Hick 5.10.24
Larks above the Mist (part 4)
Epona, goddess of the sky
Lifting heavenward all that fly
Sanctify the light today.
Mid-morning, but the mists have not dispersed
Culling the path to a stone's throw ahead.
Within the grey, a darker shape appears
Forming itself into a monstrous head
Vast and threatening as I approach
But smudged of detail or identity.
Only when I'm close enough to smell
The moss and hear the sodden branches drip
Do I begin to see the blackened trunks
Of the beech copse, sacred to Sol Epona.
Tiptoeing in, the golden canopy
Drops its quiet blessing on my head.
My mind is drifting, almost to prophecy,
As I climb the hilltop, where we herd
The horses for the winter, sensing that,
Two thousand years from now the Iron Folk
Will raise a fortress, Beranburgh by name,
To expel the herders from our native land.
On open downland, along Smeathe's Ridge,
The feral horse herds are left free to roam
Before the Beltane cull and the skill
Of metal-priests who cast the bronze into
The bits and bridles, broaches and spear-heads
Can tame the noblest stallions and mares.
I move on through wooded paths, across
The River Og, and into copses where
Plate mushrooms drip their primordial slime
Onto the rotting leaves and sodden moss
Clogging my feet, chilling bone and mind.
A wind cuts from the east as I emerge
Onto the upland moor, where grazing herds
Are silhouetted dark against the edge,
Moving silent as they crop and watch
Each other, until one breaks free to canter
Off to disappear into the mist.
The valley drops away from Pillow Mound
And on the southern side, a white mare stands
Alone, unmoved, as if she might become
One with the hillside and an icon cut
Like other figures, deep into the chalk.
The larks above the mist which drew me on
All yesterday have vanished as I squelch
This early morning back towards the ridge
And that ancestral tomb which sits just west
Of Dragon Hill and Uffington's White Horse
Leaping with the sun into the east.
Seen from Dragon Hill, the Horse leaps westward
Sinking its head beneath the rough-cut mounds
Yet, close to, its form seems to unwind
Vanishing in arcs of blazing light
And casual hints of where it might have been
Linger as chalk scars in the turf.
Brian Hick October 2012
©copyright Sally Hick 4.10.24
Larks above the Mist (part 3)
Epona, mother of the herd,
Mare and newborn foal begird;
Sanctify our droving way.
These stones have stood far longer than recall
And tribal myths don't spin their origin
But thousands must have toiled to drag these blocks
From the far west down to this sacred place
Cutting the banks, raising the palisades
To honour gods we cannot even name.
I stand mute at the outer edge
While priests before me murmur to the gods
In words I'm barred from hearing till the day
They speak them over my now lifeless corps
Preparing my soft body for the birds
My bones for burial and my soul for grace.
All ceremonies done, I can set out
Through mists on every side make all seem strange
And paths, familiar to me, melt away
Into a bland, damp greyness where the sound
Of frightened birds, aroused by my soft steps,
Are the sole traces of a living world.
Brian Hick October 2012
©copyright Sally Hick 2.10.24