Marlpost Wood, after Rain

Breathless, at the rain’s end, the sun danced

On streams gushing headstrong into heady May,

Oak leaves unfurling into myriad yellow-greens,

And bluebells that rang heavy with tainted pearls.

And all the blackbirds in Heaven’s woodlands sang,

In close adoration, to the spirits of the spring;

That they might love and urge them onward far

Into the perfection of an eternal springtime song. 

And the woods spoke to my being, beyond words,

Within the closed secret of the lasting moment.

And so I entered and utterly explored their world,

Finding it to be wonderful, and faultlessly flawed.

And then I left to join another world apart:

The world of men, and metalled winding roads,

On which machines roar, oblivious to spring,

Far past the meaning of the nightingale song. 

Then let that moment live forever, still the same,

Within the memory of a single human mind

Entrapped within the forest world of beauty,

Lost amidst the wonder and the joy of early May. 

(Marlpost Wood, Southwater, West Sussex 30^th April & 1^st May,  2008)