Early morning mist, Ladybirds and the young black cat
all there when it was still dark.

DAY IN WAITING

The mist came slinking in.
Very late. Gone 4.00. And cold.
Freezing cold.
I watched it pleat itself down the street,
One tireless fold after another,
Until all pleats and folds joined together,
A vast grey souffle of unseeing.

That’s the silent world
Showing off its power again.
Snow falling. Ice forming. Wind blowing.
There’s no end to it.
No-one ever presses the OFF switch
So stars fall without a whisper,
Enormous ships on enormous oceans
Sink without trace.
Relatives never to be seen again
And home sweet home a new place altogether.

Still, not to be dramatic.
That tissue-paper mist uncurls this time
Before any damage is done.

There’s that fat cat light on his paws,
Thoughtfully eyeing a small rustling in the hedgerow,
And on a cold white window-sill
A Ladybird lies dead and totally done for.
A brooch pinned on a day in waiting,
Making a whole posse of angels weep.

Making us weep, too.
Wondering what comes after this.

                                           © 2024 Gwen Grant

There’s always something to see at night!

FROSTY NIGHT AND JOGGER

They’re a sleepy lot
Down our street,
With the yellow lamplight
Shining on the ground,
Waiting for the first jogger
To come huffing and puffing
Down the silent morning.

Frost drifting through the air,
Tiny white dots of magic
Coming from nowhere.

The night cat is on the prowl,
Shaking its head to rid its fur
Of the tiny icy coldness.
Finding a bit of left-over fish
And a few frozen chips
Thrown down in a brown paper bag.
Still hungry. Still furious.

The dog in the warm kennel whining
For its owners to come home
Take him with them.
Take him away from the fox sniffing
Around the white garden,
Wondering if the tiny dog or the cat
Were small enough for supper.

The jogger suddenly slipping,
Landing with a crash and cursing.
Getting to his feet, bouncing.

The yellow lamplight growing brighter
And the fox eyeing him, suddenly tired
Of being cold and hungry.

© 2024 Gwen Grant

This has been a difficult summer and now I’m just emerging from
a severe bout with toothache, ending in the tooth being taken out.
There were horses everywhere in those days . A riding
school in the village often brings lovely horses past the house but
these horses don’t stop to pass the time of day. They’re working.

GALLOPING HORSES

That old broken chair
Of horsehair and shiny brown leather,
With splits in the cushions
No amount of polishing could ever repair,
Was kept so long it finally fell apart.

Clumps of wiry brown hair
Tumbling onto the green carpet.
Conjuring up quiet stables full of moonlight,
Restless horses longing to canter
On the grass in the back garden,
If that was all there was on offer.

I dreamt of glowing horses
Offered long orange carrots and ripped green apples.
Big, gentle mouths fastidiously accepting
These small fragments,
As they galloped out of my dreams
Into a world settled on all sides with houses,
Little black spaniels and friendly cats.
But I had a horse and wanted for nothing.

We had hours and hours of being together,
Racing over meadows, trotting over sand,
As that remembered brown leather became a saddle
Which, somehow, I knew how to handle,
The sound of the sea splashing all around us.

That was the way it always was
As we danced together,
On that crumpled old chair of shining brown leather.

©2024 Gwen Grant