Diwali, Manchester 2001 - by
I think of windows as I think of caves…
I think of windows as I think of caves…
Ye’d wonder foo the seasons rin
This side o’ Tweed an’ Tyne;
The hairst’s awa’; October-month
Cam in a whilie syne,
But the stooks are oot in Scotland yet
Books in cosy littered room ,
Feet in slippered ease,
Silver candles in the gloom,
Stars in naked trees
Though I know well enough
/ To hunt the Lady’s Slipper now
/ Is playing blindman’s-buff,
/ For it was June She put it on
/ And grey…
O whence the leaves
scuttering down Easter Road,
sycamore and rowan
desperate as refugees
Dhuilleag, dè an teachdaireachd
a th’ agad dhuinn an-diugh?
’S e gun tàinig foghar oirnn
’s gun deach na craobhan ruadh.
Autumn, and the nights are darkening.
The old lady tells us of her past once more.
’S mi air an t-slios ud
latha foghair,
na sligean a’ sianail mum chluasan
agus sianar marbh ri mo ghualainn
Fall, leaves, fall; die, flowers, away;
Lengthen night and shorten day;
Every leaf speaks bliss to me
Fluttering from the autumn tree.
After Pradech
/
/ The market had everything:
/ that Macedonian autumn
/ earth talked through mothers
/ standing over fruit
/
/ cooling it with water
/ for the eyes of the customers,
/ caressing…
green brown golden heaps
piling up where they drop
beneath bare-armed branches
leaves falling quietly falling
Summer is leaving too, exchanging its gold
for brass and copper. It is not so strange
to feel nostalgia for the present; already
this September evening is as old
as a photograph of itself.
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