7  On the Levels


Eyes and wrinkles, wet
Clefts swallow and separate
Shatter and wind blown mimic
The shivering skin

Rising and falling gently
Islanding pollards and squares
Of squelchy worm-ridden grass
Clumps of sedge and nettle

The deeper channels tied across
With the flickering of branches
Subdividing and giving birth
Like my own spidery writing

Then later running free like rain
With the whole sky reflected
In a glow of light and tree shadows
The ripples of movement underneath

A heart beat
A trace like speech
Or the hand's shake
Under the writing

Covered suddenly with held light
Frost and mist
Light freezing and subliming
Encrusting filth with energy

Lack
A brief hold, shifting
As the big light grows
Softens it and covers everything

With light like a flood of water
Under which and in which
Every detail grows moist and particular
Tree bark inscribed like memory or landscape

Surfaces complex and unstable
Grown upon and swept over
Scoured and crumbling
Flowing out in streams

Silvering and smoothing
Covering the land again
Levelling it
To the sky

At this point it ends
Colourless thin line
Membrane
Swept across trembling wet earth