Lyric IX from ‘Jane’

When the first darkness creeps upon the floor
Your comfort filters green into my nostrils,
There is no need to ask for something more.

Let midnight prowl and fiends of malice roar,
Sickness and age may terrorise the neighbours,
You are a rowan tree beside my door

I sail my pen along its leafing shore
And poems thrill my hand like burning berries.
There is no need to ask for something more.

And all the winds that tattered me before
Become a song of stillness in your branches.
You are a rowan tree beside my door

My waking seasons used to number four
Until I smelled you green from May to April.
My wants are dumb, I ask for nothing more.

My goal was light, my wings were spread to soar
But there’s no need to ask for something more.
You are a rowan tree beside my door.