Land of the Dripping RainLand of the dripping rain,
Home of the robin,
Where foxes run and play
Suburbanly,
Grey sea and rocky shore,
I have been here before,
England, my England,
England, my England,
England, my England, green.
Polly Robinson © 2012
The prompt for Day 17 from napowrimo was to write an epistolary poem — a poem in the form of a letter.
‘… include at least 4 of the below in your poem:
1) a song lyric
2) a historical fact
3) an oddball adjective-noun combination (like red grass or loud silence)
4) a fruit
5) the name of a street in your neighbourhood
6) a measure of distance.’
Quite a challenge, I felt. Here is my response:
To British Weather
Today you are for me
And against me.
Raindrops keep falling on my head
You invite me to catch up
With things I
Should have done
Or
Could have done
But
Didn’t do.
An interruption, intrusion!
An amazing fact is that
Animals can
Rain from the sky,
Don’t ask me why,
I looked it up
To satisfy
A requirement,
A demand,
For a poetic challenge.
Another!
One hundred yards away
Is Crown East Lane,
Where you can buy
Soft, hand-made, fragrant leather gloves
Near the Church of St Thomas.
Here, at harvest time,
The children bring baskets of
Apples, pears,
Plums and damsons.
Anyway, weather,
Where were we
Before I so
Rudely interrupted me?
Oh yes, catching up with
The things
I should have,
Could have,
And didn’t
Do.
No chance of
Gardening,
Don’t want to
Get drowned.
You are for me
Drowning
In words,
You are
Against me
Gardening.
I listen and hear,
Raindrops keep falling on my head
Dribbling, scribbling
On the windows
Dripping, gripping
The brickwork,
Soaking, cloaking
The wooden, now wet and dark,
Garage door.
And inhale the freshness of moist drops – the scent of rain.
Polly Robinson © 2012
Common Blackbird
She sits on the wooden garden bench, it is 6am in Winter, Spring is around the corner and the birds are in full song. The dawn chorus floods the air. Trilling twitters and peaking cheeps, who are these birds? What make are they? She has looked them up on the Internet, keen to identify them by their call, but if you don’t know birds, and she knows only a few, like the robin and blackbird, then it is difficult to identify them by the sound they make because one has no starting point. Trrrrrrr it, trrrrrrr it, toodle oodle, toodle oodle, brrrrr, brrrrr – is that last one cold? The fat woodpigeon is not awake yet, lazy sod, his unmistakeable call is not here and is noted for its absence.
She sits on the wooden garden bench, it is dry for a while, then a few splats of water arrive on her notepad blurring the writing, now it looks like tlllllll lt, trrlllll it, taadle aadle, taadle addle, blllll, blllll, and they might describe the sounds and they might not. Still they call. Who do they call to? Mild today. Rain has stopped. Birds keep calling. She has a crick in her neck from holding the phone between chin and shoulder, must stop doing that she tells herself daily.
No wind in the trees, no cloud in the purple sky, lilac light coming from the east and filtering through the still leafless trees. The shed silhouette is black; the apple tree guards it with the birds in the branches trilling for victory. Or something.
Polly Robinson © 2012
Rain on the garage roof,
Patter, smatter, plink.
Paint tins
Jostle jostle
On garden
Tackle tackle,
Rakes, spades, forks,
In serried ranks,
Pristine clean
Awaiting
Spring.
A rusty ladder
Propped propped,
A spokey bike to
Ride ride,
Summer party tables,
Meandering beside
Cold black barbecue,
Leaves
In frosted pots,
Aromatic apples,
Stored against the frost.
A witch’s hat
Velvet
Soft soft,
Midnight
Black black,
Sits atop a brazier;
Tyre chains dangle,
Over Rover’s
Old bowl.
Folded deck chairs,
Buckets and boules.
Bottle bank bottles
In a black plastic
Trug trug,
Ramps, silver,
Lean lean,
With mud in between,
Creosote stained
Wooden doors
Closed to the rain.
Rain on the garage roof,
Patter, smatter, plink.
Polly Robinson © 2012
A miraculously dry path,
Waits for rain,
To wash away the dust.
Polly Robinson © 2012
