A Year

April has quietly set her traps

laced my path with snags and hooks;

the heat and damp rises in my old crying field

the sunlight slants on the estuary

and it's a shivering cymbal, pitted, brassy,

and I can't get past that line, suddenly

in Carrickfergus or Walk With Me

Your tulips have sprung in our scruffy yard

a ragged mop of stalks and leaves for now

But soon the purple will show

Photo: Terry Clarke