1469

Where once the Drove Road ambled to the coast

To ship the lambs to London and the west

It peters out in terraces and lanes

Suburbanised with Chardonnay and toast.

No shepherds lead their flock across the Downs,

No lambs gambol slowly to the sea;

The sheep are segregated from the road

Which seers its croncrete way into the ground,

And though the seasons keep their wonted place

Rolling on impervious to change

The Downs lie silent underneath the roar

Of Tesco lorries angling to displace

The peace that you created at the start

To resonate within each loving heart.

Brian Hick May 2016

©copyright Sally Hick 30.5.26

 1468

Five years ago these notebooks all were full

Of poems and the comments in between

Far less substantial than the teaming verse;

But now creative notions are more lean

With pages full of meetings and the terse

Reflections on directives, new reports

On better ways of filling up our time -

As if that really mattered - when the curse

Of work is draining all the daily joy

Which comes from letting new ideas flow

And writing for its own sake seems to pale

Before the need to let the minutes grow.

            So I write this in hope for better days

            When verse won't need excuse to sing your praise.

Brian Hick June 2015

©copyright Sally Hick 25.5.26

 1467

Solstice

From this high point the cycle starts again

Little by little the sun will drift away

Until the darkness and the cold

Win out against the brightness of the day

But through all the cycles of the year

Your love is constant, like the ebbing seas

Which seem impervious to the length of days

Moved by a higher force than storm or breeze

And while we vacillate, emotions tossed

By every fashion, every casual word,

Your silence speaks eternity

Wherever it is heard.

Brian Hick June 2015

©copyright Sally Hick 22.5.26

 1466

Solstice; though clouds now hide the sun

Dawn winds rumbling through Gillsman's Wood

Muffle the chorus which has just begun.

Solstice

And I've decided, as I knew I must,

To move away from deadlines, to run

The race that raises me from out the dust

To fly unhindered until they are gone

The hypoctrites, the cynics, the unjust,

Who dare come between me and the One,

Solstice,

Brian Hick June 2015

©copyright Sally Hick 20.5.26

 1465

A week to Solstice

Evening light survives

As if the sun cannot let go

The land she loves

And dares not sink

Save for a brief respite

The coolness of the night

A silence in the trees

Snoring from open windows

Soft pad of foxes in the dark

Brian Hick June 2015

©copyright Sally Hick 18.5.26

 1464

A swan, out below

The weir, has two grey cygnets

Snuggled on her back.

I'm dive-bombed

By a flock of swallows

Casually gleaning

Across subble fields.

Brian Hick summer 2015

©copyright Sally Hick 16.5.26

 1463

Two weeks to the Solstice

Bright skies and a brisk breeze

Ease us into summer.

My seventieth

Though I don't recall

Most of them;

But memory is fickle

And the few

Outweigh the many

Passed unmarked.

Solstice.

Fulcrum of the year

Tipping point between

Firle Beacon in the heat

Tumbling waves

Fledglings and plump lambs

Before a winding down

Towards the hug of autumn.

Iona and Lindisfarne

Both knew the truth

That seasons hold more sway

Than artificial festivals of saints

And chalk cut figures

Standing stones and hills

Are simpler links

Than any urban shrine.

Seventy years sing out a simple truth.

You speak to me in what you have created

And smile when I've insisted I know better

Hinting that your ways are overrated.

Atop the Beacon or striding the Drove Way

Your love shines on me - like the sun today.

Brian Hick summer 2015

©copyright Sally Hick 13.5.26