After the meeting...

After the meeting.... The Voice
(with apologies to Rupert Brooke)

Safe in the magic of my woods
I lay, and watched the dying light.
Faint in the pale high solitudes,
And washed with rain and veiled by night.

Silver and blue and green were showing,
And the dark woods grew darker still,
And birds were hushed; and peace was growing,
And quietness crept up the hill;

And no wind was blowing...

And I knew
that this was the hour of knowing
And what had been said in unkind ways
Had struck at part of the heart of me.

I remembered that poem
In my mother's old book
And fled to the bookshelf to take a look
At the passionate words, to clear my head
Of voices scorning my earnestness.

It always works - I lay and smiled
on my dear flat bed of restfulness
I thought "the sunset's pretty isn't it?"
And apathy slid down the hill.

Pam Morrison