Hugh Underhill
The Spilling of Seed
They call it the Candle Tree.
With what unashamed extravagance the miniature
pink or white pyres burned in springtime
among magnanimous green-fingered foliage
lining the street before the Strict Baptist
Providence Chapel!
What strict baptistry
must be practised behind that stern facade! -
eighteen-nineties architectural plain-speaking,
a bit high in the collar but a just nicety
in the classical restatement, no truck
with Victorian flounce and fuss, unornate
portals and round-arched windows
doubled like raised eyebrows
of provident citizenry
bred in respectable dissent: Bunyan,
that local fire-eater, long since an icon.
Perhaps these trees with middle-aged spread
are not strictly reverent - their sap
still fused with the Elstow boy’s heat -
for also in October their behaviour lacks restraint,
their fruits unable to contain themselves
puttering on the pavement, rubbery skins gashing
to flash glossiest tempting
virginal brown, bounding
on car-rooves with a sound
as of the striking of gongs
even upon these four
long-faced black limousines
sliding to a halt beneath the comfortable trees.
Then the pavements are trodden with spilt
milk-fresh flesh of conkers.
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