A weekend with our older daughter in Oxfordshire meant a long walk through cold, muddy fields with a bitter wind flushing our cheeks and finding its way through every small gap in our clothing. Our boots were heavy with clay as we scrambled over stiles, crossed an icy stream on a narrow wooden bridge and our breath clouded in the chill air and left droplets on eyelashes and faces.
Winter TreesThe wet dawn inks are doing their blue dissolve.
On their blotter of fog the trees
Seem a botanical drawing.
Memories growing, ring on ring,
A series of weddings.
Knowing neither abortions nor bitchery,
Truer than women,
They seed so effortlessly!
Tasting the winds, that are footless,
Waist-deep in history.
Full of wings, otherworldliness.
In this, they are Ledas.
O mother of leaves and sweetness
Who are these pietas?
The shadows of ringdoves chanting, but chasing nothing.
Sylvia Plath
We watched the winter sun set behind the hill, our shadows lengthening behind us
and made for the pub, yellow light shining through the panes, a cap of black, thatched reeds keeping out the cold
and inside to the fire, the dogs, the men in tweeds and corduroy,
and steaming hot chocolate.
