At The Poetry Workshop

           AT THE POETRY WORKSHOP

           (for Mabel Ferrett & Norman Nicholson)

           In the back garden
           eight poets scan the sky
           searching with binoculars
           somewhere between Aldebaran
           and the Pleiades
           for the hairy star
           blamed for Harold's
           downfall at Hastings.

           There is nothing to be seen
           but reflections of sodium street light
           except for those with more vision
           or imagination.

           As we recross the Pennines
           at midnight,
           clouds descend
           over these northern, November moors,
           forbidding further attempts
           at spotting our traveller
           whom my son, now eight,
           waits to see -
           now -
           not at age eighty-three !

           © GERALD ENGLAND

Composed: Ashton under Lyne, 12th November 1985

Publication

1986 POEMS FOR HASTINGS (Ashton under Lyne, New Hope International)