The Ends Of Roads Poem by Sally Evans

I love the ends of roads,
that peter out on proms,
circle round a teashop
closed half the year,
suddenly become private
where an old casement swings
or a jeep is parked,
turn into a dell, grassy
or a classy drive,
become 'unsuitable
for motors' and for feet -
forever await a ferry
or fail below a mountain peak.

Then when the trail runs homw,
and I have driven over
a fabric of fringed ends,
blind country crossroads
angled like a web
over hillocks and bays,
cu-de-sacs, farmsteads,
a gappead wall, a frail gate -
a slight hint of trespass
hidden and overgrown
in the bright, glinting lanes -
I love their misty range
and solitude on the journey -
yet always find them strange.

1990