Poetry Magazines - The best collection of poetry magazines online - Simon Armitage

Poetry Library Southbank Centre - The Poetry Library housing the Arts Council Collection at Southbank Centre

« Previous item
Contents of this issue
Next item »

Nigel Jarrett

print this page

Incident At The Cayo

You could be mad in those days:
A Manny Bumford, eyeing the brolly
On a woman’s lap at the doctor’s
Then snapping it clean across his knee;
Or an Aubrey Harvey, that puffing troll
Astride the gully in Church Road.
Shufflers, barmy denizens bouncing
From road to pavement – you crossed over
When their front doors loomed
Or you met them face to face, their eyes
Spinning at some crazy event in your hair.
Only the grown-ups were fearless,
Pitying them as stunted coevals.

But you, too, come at last
To the empty threat of witlessness:

Sold-up Iolo Bevan keeps an ewe alive,
Grateful for the time she’s taken,
The shaven fleece, her providence
At each of his whistled-in years.
They say he’s done with killing;
The pit dug for that whiskered nag
He hauled to the lee of Gray Hill
Saw him slip away by degrees.
He’ll wheel the sheep out in time,
To meet his senses in the wild rye.

Back to top