Mown

I could drift on the scent of it,
but instead let me say how

the cut grass, faded, bunched together
against vivid green turf

reminds me of nothing more
than clouds viewed from above

and brings back for a second
the feelings that bloom —

the earth’s curve as an open bracket
as if we are borne from the page –

and scatter when the tyres hit the tarmac.

Sky in a Second Language

1.
I think of Mother’s chair,
the one she loved with the dark wood
and pale green felt attached to its arms
by rows of tiny brass buttons.

When she had that chair
it was a thing to use, to sit on.
But then she had to sell it
to pay the bills she couldn’t pay.

Then she had only the word ‘chair’
and would have to stand,
like a signpost, pointing her mouth
towards the thing itself.

2.
The sky in a second language
is changed from what it was
at home: the rich, thick, open blue
washed from it by the sound
that stakes a claim upon it.

‘Sky.’ Even the word
has metal in its middle.
On most days the sky is grey.
Sometimes there are sunsets
of honey-water, but still that metal.

I have friends here who are scientists.
They get drunk and talk
of dark matter.
Even where there is nothing,
they say, there is something.

I would like to know what it is
that fills the gaps, that holds apart
the things that are
from the words that we use
to describe them.