The Windmills and the Water

Out here with the windmills, and the water, and the snare drum moon,

foxes dream of the henhouse, while fossils sleep in stone.

A farmyard cat under a tin stage, silver belly to the dirt,

a glass-eyed mouse in his teeth, a drop of pink on his coat.

Last night I dreamed of Mollie Marriott in a sapphire Jaguar,

a modern Mansfield, with her mother’s charm and Stevie’s Fender guitar.

Then I was down by the mud-green river, back in the dirty old town.

Ronnie Wood and a loping greyhound pack, out where the swans set down.

And The Chestnut Chase, and Mr Levy, and Alma Cogan and a ruby ring.

Out here blackberry season is waning. The fruits’ tight cells now distended by rain,

like the soft bellies of the old men on the prom, watching the waves roll in.

At dusk the campsite kids, in tracksuits and tutus, are whooping on the parallel bars,

and taking awkward bows for the final spins of their fearless, unbruised years.