BEARD (This old house).

 

This thing is become part of me.

I took it off once and I vanished -

my daughter wept and it had to grow again –

so I have become part of IT.

if you see what I mean…..

 

These fifty years I have hid

much of myself in this thicket

though I was once thought foolish

to cultivate on the doorstep

what grows wild around

my friends’ back entrances …

so now it keeps off the wind

although sometimes I don’t like

 the way it cries to the world

“,,, here lives a grey old badger…”

and the maidens run away laughing.

 

I now have these windows, too – to peer with

over the old hedge at the neighbours,

with bulging sides and cracked plaster

the house is crumbling everywhere…

 

Anyhow, one day soon I’ll fool the lot.

Prop up the hedge, panes, leaning walls,

worn thatch, blistered paint and all,

and sneak off up the road.

To live in a new house without attributes,

or perhaps a signpost ?

in a cultivated part of town

with better,wooden walls.