Tributary

You rose to
Swap buckets sloppily
Out of the underbelly,
While I shotput the mud downstream,
Hoping to be a help amongst the

Gunge. We were a team,
Rising and falling to
Drain the water tank,
While Cass looked on
In twitched interest.

It’ll be another twenty-five
Until works needed here again,
By when you and Christine and dog
Will surely then be returned
To that landscape and set to stream

You rise and bend for the blockage,
Elemental man.
Never mind the muck because
Boots and fleece can be washed later, after
The work is done and the bung hole plugged.

“This is what noise a little trickle makes”,
Said Christine when sandbag and stone was cleared,
And into the time vault there fell,
Little by little,
The cavernous sound

Comfy Chair (II)

I remember sleeping
In the spare room of The Coachhouse
(Was it not my first night staying
There since the funeral?)
And greeting you as usual with
Hug and holding on, until
Soon we were spinning round,
Sort of waltzing slow, then
Fast as others in the room watched.
I was embarrassed, but held on to your
Weighty shoulders all the same
In the morning I came downstairs;
Door-slide, warm slate under barefoot,
Sitting where starched legs tanned.
And when I looked up at The Gribben,
I saw a giant sat on his comfy chair,
And felt at first that it was
You who were clinging on hardest

David Jones in Brockley Cemetery

I also played in Hilly Fields as a boy and
Cosy the Welsh within me, like the
Fusil butt snuggled in his arm crook;
The small of the stock snuffed in his grip.
I like choosing not to walk past him but
Knowing the letters are still there,
Engraver incarnate
Embossed, like the boy’s slab that’s
Hidden in park grass not too far away

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