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To Essex<\/strong><\/p>\n Worn stones lean toward the train, where Newbury hauls its concrete ankh, black turf Foot-by-foot I trudge the sallow marsh. <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n To Essex Worn stones lean toward the train, where blue lichens graze on lost nouns, passengers stuck still waiting for a service. In Leyton, four men carry one bouquet, dark lilies and chrysanthemums, extras from Brueghel’s Triumph, their smiles fluted with bleakness and paper laughter, canned sounds trying hard to bear the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18922","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-prose-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18922","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18922"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18922\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18923,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18922\/revisions\/18923"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18922"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18922"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18922"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nblue lichens graze on lost nouns, passengers
\nstuck still waiting for a service.
\nIn Leyton, four men carry one
\nbouquet, dark lilies and chrysanthemums,
\nextras from Brueghel’s Triumph, their
\nsmiles fluted with bleakness and
\npaper laughter, canned sounds trying hard
\nto bear the weight of life.
\nAbove broods a distempered sky: ash,
\nashen\u2014the all-too-easy indolence
\nof grey, the readiness to hand,
\nmetallic cloughs of cloud,
\npig iron poorly oxidised with rain.<\/p>\n
\nand wire fences pattern low mist,
\nFather-son football, homely as witch-hazel,
\ndrubs along the weekend pitch,
\nsleet-buckled limbs tussle for warmth
\nwhile the bystanders inculcate a chant,
\ntheir coven of waterproofs whipped
\nby a tangy breeze. The last of autumn
\nghosts the birches, frail gold that tells
\nof nothing but fall. The rest: brown,
\nred-brown, dull mulch and sparse woods
\ntrunk-wound with sheepish ivy, glum
\nfairy lights sporting arrowed filament.<\/p>\n
\nA last sun wilts its way through formless,
\ntemporary pools. Your voice carries,
\nvowels flattened by the plain,
\nI worm you out across the saltings,
\ncoarse with mud and the turgid dunes
\nof silt, fat as an intake of breath.
\nA stranded lightship yawns for tide
\nand oh how birded the sky\u2014
\nthe iron, indolent,\u00a0 rain-gestured grey,
\nwings peeling, sketching dark migrations
\nabove the cross beams and rigging.
\nOur mouths leave no tongue left wanting
\nas we curl back through the meadow,
\nexhausted, slack and sore with dusk,
\nwhile all around the vanished sea
\nspeaks once again of flood.<\/p>\n