From Durham Poems by Douglas Clark
May you always find your way back Douglas
THE RUINED CHAPEL
After all these years
I return
To the empty chapel at the world's end.
The citadel by the sea is vacated,
The chapel a desolate ruin in the forest,
The horsemen ghosts.
I look at the white-trumpeted green convolvulus
Climbing over the ruin.
Bare branches on the trees. No leaves.
I have no imagination,
I cannot visualise back twenty years.
The path is overgrown with brambles and creepers.
We came this way in the days before Autumn
Once upon a time.
Hang out your brightest colours
I need words to confirm the truth of this,
The grey stone-built chapel in the clearing
Where all questions are answered.
Two candles and two red-backed bibles,
A silver cross, loot for black-robed horsemen,
The greatest cathedral north of the Alps
Fallen into disrepair.
The forest is full of the sparkling birds of Summer
The music flutes and I return.
Roger Collett
Arrowhead Press
http://www.arrowheadpress.co.uk/
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Imagination is the one weapon in the war against reality."
Jules de Gaultier
|