Nasturtiums

The Nasturtiums
We see you from our breakfast window
against the blue of the morning sky
four flames above our ageing heads
smiling and laughing in the awakening light
there where you should not be
so pleased in your swaying movements
colouring in the sky outside the lines of your
herbaceous family
How did you get there we ask in wonder
and they, above the downpipe
nestled in the smooth trough of the gutter
answered all together like a choir before the song
like a class of children before teacher appears

One at a time and I will listen like the night

I was pecked from the earth by hungry crow
In its dress suit, it caw-cawed angrily
strutting and hopping, clicking and cooing
while the sparrows flurried away for safety
I was swallowed, churned and spattered
in the coils of its gullet, in which order I do not remember
in its flight to the lofty branches of the yellow wood
then smeared and squeezed out of the darkness
dropped free-falling like a skydiver
through molecules of mist
to land clumsily into this soil of earth
and lose all consciousness for a season

Oh I was brought here by an ant that was lost
she found me rolled up like a tiny ball
waiting for the wind to take me to my new home
she was part of a regiment of ants who seemed
To march leff-right, leff-right into each other with a kiss
or did they pass secrets to each other?
My ant started rolling me away like a dung beetle
I could feel her powerful leg prick into me
as she lifted me onto her wiry back of steel
We darted along a gully of cement
other ants carrying their load behind
with bricks like mountains on each side of us, over puddles of water
It was like a funeral procession
my funeral
Then my ant took a wrong turn which the others ignored
we climbed into a drainpipe and darkness fell
we seemed to ascend the pipe in a spiral movement
stopping to rest, recover, strut, rest, recover, strut
my ant was breathing deeply, straining her legs draining her strength
Then brilliant light as we emerged from the black hole
I rolled away into a paradise of soil which the rain had left
the ant mesmerized by the light and exhausted
staggered and fell into the vortex of the drain hole
I sank with relief into a fungus of earth, sleep

The children played on the lawn on Christmas day
with their new toy that whizzed through the air
a flying saucer they called frisbee
they aimed and threw giggling their merriment
as it scythed the grass and crashed a tree
I was scuffed up onto it and spun through the air
like a seed in a roulette of chance
then thrown off course I landed on the roof
and when Dad brought a ladder to gather it
I slid to safety into the soil set there for me

But how will you get back to real earth below
stupid question, the children will know
You must risk a little and go where the wind takes you

There they shine fluttering in the breeze
like the magi of old they are gifts for our day
living on the edge and making a home
inviting us to be more at home
and more beyond ourselves

• Poem for Grandchildren living far away
• Reflection on the Conversion of St Paul
• Reflection on the Sower
• The Mustard Seed Prose Poem
• Report on the launch of my poetry book, The Dance of Life