GROUNDED

 

GROUNDED

On emerging from hospital after major surgery in October 2022 I was restricted to the house and vicinity for a while. My main exercise was walking slowly around the neighbourhood - no jogging allowed. I found the reduction in pace made me more aware of the ground...

Acorn time

is here again.

Why can’t I be a squirrel

or a pig? 

Would you rather

be cradled or stung

when you drift to the end of your glide?

Really? Perhaps you're an oak leaf.

When leaves lie down with stones

the delicacy of tones

has a mottled continuity

defying the contrast of weights. 

 

You will not find

a more natural grout

than moss. Although, I concede,

that does leave the question of effectiveness.

The sunset leaf

may never set

but it will turn – I guess I should say turn again -

to mulch.

Does toadstool beauty

correlate with deadliness?

I may defer

that  particular piece of research.

 

If cones

are evolving the means to fly

that little bit further from parental shade

then this may be a prototype.

 

Considering

that it has no roots

moss is pretty hard to pull -

not up I suppose, but away.

Five to six

by leaf clock:

another day has almost passed

staring up from the down of the ground.

In the contest of thorns

there's only one winner.

Please let me land - though this isn't a request -

in a prickle of bramble.

                
 

The good things about this pot

are the cubist perspective

and not having to worry

about it getting broken.

When a falling leaf

lands on a log

there’s a logic to its flutter

into doubly sad sense.

 

To give early mornings

their due, everything looks

as fresh as a geranium –

pending a daisy coming along.

 

This jewelled leaf

would be worth a fortune

if only it could be fixed as is

and turned into a brooch. 

 

What’s the point

of cracks in the road

if water doesn’t use them  

to drain away?

Do they remember

the air, the breeze, the sense of community,

how being wet was just a staging post to dryness?

You’re going to tell me not…

 

Cut grass meets blown leaves?

Seems wrong to me...

I do wish the seasons

would make up their minds!

My theory is

that all roadworks strive for the ideal state

in which there is nothing to be done -

meaning no finish can ever occur.

 

 

The tragedy is

that a leaf can drown

in almost no water

like a person stunned in their bath.

 

Just how primitive can you get?

Never mind Conan after ten pints,

the horse tail’s type was at its most prevalent

500m years ago. 

 (Equisetum is a 'living fossil', the only living genus of the entire subclass Equisetidae, which for over 100 million years was much more diverse and dominated the understorey of late Paleozoic forests) 

 

This must be

an important puddle:

few are judged of sufficient note

to be pointed out by their very own arrow.

 

 

X marks the spot

of a tarmac cross-out

that hints at the other way

out of the hospital. 

So what

if I'll grow back? 

Would you like your limbs

to be cropped like hair?

 

 

 

Of course I'm astonished

that simply by driving over the pavement

the sum of cars can replicate

the network of local roads.

(the leaves represent the parish church (upper left), the shops (right) and the primary school (lower left))

Seen from above

this dark leather glove

says nothing of love

though it may hint at darker things you can’t expect to rhyme. 

I sometimes wonder

If it isn’t the leaves

that fall to the ground

but only their ghosts.