From After Wordsworth ‘Five Poems On The Naming Of Places’

April morning
a small stream running
with a young man’s speed
the sound of winter’s water
through budding groves

city sunrise
she weaves between
still traffic
police sirens echo
building to building

walking
through the confusion
a leafless ash-tree

sitting
in the coffee-shop
dirt under her nails

alive to everything
songbirds vying with
a waterfall

neon signs
flick on and off
sidewalk daisies
swapping stories
with a policeman

a single cottage
on the distant mountain
bright green hawthorn
talking to shepherds
on this wild nook

Paul Conneally

August 2001