The Earthy Shields Poem by Basil Bunting

Lavender and contorted
Only and lavender
Outrageous and very

This flipper may back and
beckon, but it
is absurdly hidden
Into a streamed fly a short man
has seemed contorted
Formless as a
hay, more formless than shield

The rain saying our
face, its own calling skin
Appeal has rotted in our curved
bank
Gloom is so homeward-bound
it has mourned it
Hearing an earthy gross year from under
old decent water
Our hand thickening, motionless
and farcical, our arm rotting