Journeys Copyright © Richard J Whiting 2011

She lies, propped,
Eyes level with roof-tops.
Sees swallows
Lining the wires
Never to return
For a thousand years,
A thousand years.

Her pain spreads;
Quietly at first,
Thunder rolling
Across green valleys,
Then, in deafening pain
Warm hands sooth,
Offering a sip
Of brighter weather.
She sleeps, sleeps,
But never rests,
Never rests.

In league with the night
She listens to owls,
A skein of Canadian Geese,
Dogs’ protests at paperboys,
At postmen
As milk bottles rhyme
With morning.

Someone lets Delius in;
A Walk In The Paradise Garden,
England, her England,
She will buy a maisonette
Down by the lake
Where herons stalk
And children play…
She’ll ring them in the morning...

Morning, morning, she sleeps,
Wakes and Delius has flown
Through the bedroom window,
Elgar in his wake;
Bringing a land
Of sadness, beauty
Which she walks with
Youthful steps,
Leaps and bounds
And she’s climbing the hedge,
A child in the holidays
Standing by suitcases
Waving to beckoning friends,
Family, lovers again
Watching for the taxi, bus, train…

And in the room
They see her face
Lighting the silence.

Time passes;
The ticking of tears,
She smiles
Eyes open
Though she’s already flown
Far, far away
Into the night.

Blinds are drawn,
Windows shut,
The traffic is silenced;

And the last of the swallows
Has swung from the wires.