There Is A Friend Who Sticketh Closer Poem by Giles Watson

There Is A Friend Who Sticketh Closer



Why, when you enter the room, does my heart
turn warm and red, and all those other words
grow muffled, as under snow? Why do leaf veins
seem to swell with green blood, and the forms
of all things become rounder and aglow? Why
do the shadow and the echo gain such sudden
substance; why does water seem to flow
more slowly, birds to consider more closely
the cadences of their songs? Why is there
sudden, gratuitous artistry in the dried sloe,
the crow-feather, the sunlight and cedar cone?
Why does the pulse of all run cold when I turn
to go? When I step over the rod, why does a poem
fall from me like a child of Arianrhod?

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Giles Watson

Giles Watson

Southampton
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