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Edmund Prestwich

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Hadedas

Two hadedas stalk,
stabbing the dry lawn
of my childhood garden,
then take off with harsh laughter.

It's hard to recognise
our house in this dull bungalow,
its new roof jaundice yellow.
My mother's poplars are gone,
with the whippy swords
I drew from them
to flourish in the burning light;
the passionate joy
of reading as a boy
on that sunny stoep, or leaning out,
a hoplite in a cruising prow,
when the Playing Fields spread like the sea;
when Theseus crept with his thread
through our corridor at night
to Ariadne's bed,
and a house-snake flowed through the lamplight.

My life was in its dreaming then,
our tin roof thrust at the stars.
As I stood outside with dad
gazing at night's vastness -
Venus over the neighbours' trees -
we felt the whole earth moving.
A satellite twinkled past.

Six thousand miles of the world
rolled under me as I flew,
the day before yesterday,
to stand in this street today,
thirty-odd years since I learned
how Vasco da Gama passed
"our" Cape with his tiny ships
five hundred years ago.

My flying trip would have seemed
a miracle to him;
yet I'm no nearer then
than before I came, moving through space
to find a time, like a child
at a slide show, reaching
to catch the images
that stream through the shining air.

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