Amesbury

Of the villages I remember the streams
Of the streams weed-walking water birds
Fly-catching in the cold rain, and water-
Lillies filling like doomed ships. Under water
Something tangles and untangles. I am
None of this. What’s Guinevere to Jews? A myth
Something they would not think of for themselves.

Antediluvian the downs, the chalk,
The flints they made the church and abbey of.
And how did flints get here? The explanations
Make no sense. The poppies in that rotted
Wall are not my allegory of love
And sleep. This is somebody else’s mind,
For me, madness. I make my way. The rain