Sisters
Your face her body
her face your body
once
but now memory she lies
head cocked to one side at the foot of the churchyard
you thrive on fresh air –
walk the hopfields carry a hot water bottle
follow
your dog through woods
to lakes frozen by January ice
but there’s no denying she is you
and you now hold her this weight we need you to carry
it is a burden for you to live up to – we know that
your grief hurricanes you through countrysides
tracks down paths she may have trod crunch of snow
hard frosts
nothing deters you you will find your way back –
led by a Labrador who sniffs through bracken
in the winter haze leaps
leaps through trees’ shadows
searches ensures you’re following
waits for a ghost round corners presumes it listens or fades
elsewhere
or maybe a ghost will leaf through trees leading us
there is this need to touch a ghost and ask do you follow the same
path
how to look at these woods a close up neglects the wider view -
an expanse of oaks form a pattern to close the world keep ghosts
apart
ghosts who roam and fly above a tangle of roots and branches or
do we see each tree as her
branches bent in the wind to listen head raised the newest
shoot
you began your journey twenty-eight years ago as you
but to your mother you return as
two
her face your body
once
but now memory she lies
head cocked to one side at the foot of the churchyard
you thrive on fresh air –
walk the hopfields carry a hot water bottle
follow
your dog through woods
to lakes frozen by January ice
but there’s no denying she is you
and you now hold her this weight we need you to carry
it is a burden for you to live up to – we know that
your grief hurricanes you through countrysides
tracks down paths she may have trod crunch of snow
hard frosts
nothing deters you you will find your way back –
led by a Labrador who sniffs through bracken
in the winter haze leaps
leaps through trees’ shadows
searches ensures you’re following
waits for a ghost round corners presumes it listens or fades
elsewhere
or maybe a ghost will leaf through trees leading us
there is this need to touch a ghost and ask do you follow the same
path
how to look at these woods a close up neglects the wider view -
an expanse of oaks form a pattern to close the world keep ghosts
apart
ghosts who roam and fly above a tangle of roots and branches or
do we see each tree as her
branches bent in the wind to listen head raised the newest
shoot
you began your journey twenty-eight years ago as you
but to your mother you return as
two
Wendy French’s pamphlet collection, Sky Over Bedlam, was published in 2002. She appears in the Poetry School anthology, Entering the Tapestry.
Page(s) 41-42
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