and so with bodiless eyes they went to ground
beyond the dry-stone wall, the stand of trees
with all this life untouched and spread before
till, in the midst of thought, the sea was at their feet
          summerday bright
          sun-saturated blue
and they were lost before such wide expanse
so blue to the last, to the full-most point of blue

and all this pulse of life declining to a point
to the sound of bird-song at the very end
that final twitter in the deepening sky
which, deep-flare red, expressed its dying self
its evening, falling sense of self and life
its close-of-day declining into loss
which they all saw but did not comprehend
          such failing sight
          such vision drifting by
their minds wrapped up in darkness which was not,
of course, a metaphor for the evening sky
but somehow caught itself within itself

now all this turns from shifting summer blue
to deepened shades of purpled blue and red
and that flock of birds across the field of sight
          plunging through the light
          sweeping in then out
all flamed to disappearance, then white against the sea
so sharp from this high point above the town

and all those lengthened years that echo back
that trudge about the harbour and the castle walls
that sense of being quite in place, beneath these hills
all this is now such undistilled desire
as we are watched by things from distant fields
and from the edges of those distant fields
that hedge set in place generations before
          sepia-still
          pictured here
your grandfather's brother leaning back on the wall
to take a little time at the end of his long day
just a blink ago for the stretch of sea and sky

at the end of this long day they went to ground
and cupped their hands about their ears
to drown out all the noise of cars and shops
to hear the thump and rush of their own blood
to breathe in deep and sneeze in the evening air
          now slowing down
          now resting back
and squeezing shut their eyes to take a pause

these motions are what might be most expected
          so they thought
these motions put us firmly in that place
          or so they said
where all we are can come to sudden blush
with such a rush of doubly deepened sense
that anything else is of such small account
of such short change or shoulder-shrugged inconsequence
amongst the smallest turns of half-coughed thought
beside this sense of being in our place
amongst these hills, close by our sweep of sea

but no, not theirs, always beyond themselves
in blue, or grey, or dirty dull grey-green
beneath the always-changing skies out here
          far out west
          quite at the edge
in ragged curve of bay, hugged close to the land
it is here, just here, we go at last to ground

 

Copyright © Matthew Jarvis, 2006.

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Matthew Jarvis — formerly a lecturer in the English Department at the University of Wales, Aberystwyth — is now an independent writer and critic. He is currently working on a book called Place and Environment in Radical British Poetry for the Rodopi series 'Nature, Culture and Literature'. He lives in Aberystwyth.