Myra Schneider
Taking Off
Through the huge years of childhood
I yearned to stroke sheep
And sighting a dingy lump
Doggedly munching grass
I forgot I was dragging, self-sorry
Behind grown-ups on a walk
Across the gorse-bushed golf-course.
I ran, crouched, crawled
Towards the unsuspecting ewe
Agog to touch its straggle-greyness.
Once my eager fingers
Closed in on a muddy rump
But it shot through a hoop
Of terror, out of my reach.
Once I had easy success
With a tame, half-grown lamb
And found the fleece wasn’t fluff
But rug-wool disappointment.
Through the huge years of childhood
I longed to lift off and fly.
I stood on moors, belled
With heather, crossed by paths
Of silken sand, looked down
On the open-mouthed Clyde
And with arms outstretched
Made runs, half pretending,
Half hoping to take off.
My heavy feet clung to the ground.
But at night in the world of bed
I could make my mind leap
Beyond the wastes strung with reeds,
Wrung by peewits’ cries,
To pine forests where the trees
Stood stiff-backed,
Hoarding combs of darkness
And witches’ tangled secrets
Tightly as furled, unready buds.
Page(s) 25
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