I like the 'land as body' metaphor - worked over in an interesting new way
'hip of a hill' and 'arterial hedges'
I wonder about the title - perhaps too 'in your face'? I'd rather find the
Christ figure in the poem than be told too soon to expect his coming?
Terri )O(
-----Original Message-----
From: The Pennine Poetry Works [mailto:[log in to unmask]]On
Behalf Of Mike Horwood
Sent: 24 January 2003 10:17
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: New sub: The yellow christ
The Yellow Christ
Colour can meld body and landscape.
Suspended over yellow fields
and the hip of a hill
the memory of green in the lemon grass
behind this Christ is in his skin.
Trees as red as body organs,
supplied by arterial hedges,
spread a feverish rash
across this country, exhausted
and silent and still.
Three women kneel around the yellow Christ,
grown out of the ground he embodies.
They mourn for this sick land.
Mike
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