67


it was Beethoven who first observed
the road to Rotterdam was paved with chub
well it's not cramp & it's not flamenco
I just lay my burden down
& someone picked it up
& ran out of the station
you damn right I got the blues
though the bushes now lean in
with more than a Hint of Mint
& the Vauxhall Astra Green
which haunt the season's magazines
     it is true that in our younger days
we were meteorites over Burnley
but now anonymous visitors
have to rattle a poker around in our mouths
when it is time to start the day
so many August stars have plummeted
from the windy darkness between
Perseus & Cassiopeia
since I first took Leonora for the coalman





Norfolk        August 2009