Ballads, Two

2nd revised and enlarged edition
Published 15th August 2005
A5, 28pp, stapled, card cover
ISBN 978-1-905465-02-6
£4.00

Contents:
The Mother & the Monument
Dear John
Hector’s Ghost
Icarus Beneath the Waves
Acheron
Anchoress
Shanty
Sitting Still
The Fool
Two Towers
The House
A Man Outside a Cage

Anchoress

Eastward the rising sun levels
and sets alight, surmounts the baseless line
of ragged peaks. Dust-devils
raised by the dawn lie flat, and lizards catch the shine
of a new day.

She climbs the stair, up through the rock
unliving, but warm with the warmth of life.
Only one dandelion clock
of cloud strives with the light, then abandons the strife
and blows away.

There’s the nameless plain, men once gone,
that earth shall be again. She combs the sand
and watches the hours wear on,
the shadows shorten, shading her eyes with her hand,
keeping the faith.

Unbroken circle of sky
and the bare inhuman breadth of the land,
and unseen cities whose high
hopes shimmer, built by the countless, the dreamless hand,
balance on her breath.