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SLOES
on the death of a child
have
you seen a hedge at winter's end
go billowing down to a grey sea;
flowers that you mistake for cloud or a late frost?
this
is the sloe, the black-
thorn, that blooms before the leaves unfurl
that wears no green in her bone-thin blossoming
but only thorns
grievous and long
she
will not stay for us
her petals melt
like hailstones on the tongue
once
fledged, her leaves
pierce your heart with their tender green
and in their midst the fruit ripens
blue-black, beautiful
gentled with bloom
like shadow on snow
with
the first frosts
(the wild geese harking overhead
on their urgent journeys)
you gather them to steep in spirit,
marvelling,
as the months pass,
how darkness clears to this true fire
how bitterness will distil such sweetness on the air |