Pilgrim

1 in tight lines a dozen houses line the winter wheat – already: frail bungalows with front lawns, at the village edge; homes, already, transitory as inns, and clamped to a new access road that slices though the down. diggers have quarried the chalk - upended it; torn out the clay beneath -heavy, dark,greasy as abattoir meatembedded with flints,clewingto a long-departed sea. in a web of cul-de-sacs,of silent gardensof chipboard walls history is being forgotten; the land is practicinghow to die. SNODLAND, MARCH 1977 2 clouds clogthe river’s fallen level - a dry dayat the furthest edgeof summer; at the month’salmost-final,almost-end-point, flat and still; indestructible. hay,cropped in silent meadowsrests in long gold lines; the battles to be foughtare far away;nothing is corruptible; now is all there is. THE RIVER BEULT, AUGUST 1977 3 wadein the corn wavesundisturbed; come home -there is no toll; the hip-grasswill conceal and recall; fearing no fall,the dusty greenwill restore the world, its marks, its scars - bring itto a field of sun - to this home,crushed outwithin it. NEAR CRANBROOK, AUGUST 1977 4 of coursethere are grander thingsthan this Victorian rebuildingof medieval stone; but not for me. for eight years i have beenits steadfast visitor, a pilgrim of sorts,returning to a placewhere nothingis urgent; where custom points, like transepts,to the enfoldingfields and woodsfirst written in Doomsday. THE CHURCH OF ALL SAINTS, BIRLING, MARCH 1978 5 amongst the few remaining leavesof last year’s autumn, daffodils shakein a slight breeze; they lord it over the wilderness - the stone angeldrowsy under moss; the mausoleums,rectangular, preoccupied; the crooked tombstones,dreaming of placesother than this; the sleeping columbariaspread betweenthe shot green shavingsof recent trees - defiant,redeeming. BIRLING CHURCHYARD, MARCH 1978 6 winter rainhas darkenedthe hayrick’s sides; nowa nine-hour sunexpands upon it, restores it,saves itwith lengthening days; returning all. SNODLAND, MAY 1978 7 onlyon the roadbetween the trees; onlyon Birling Hilldo i evadethe day; slip the sununder leaf; freewheelon the scarp, believing onlyin Cistern Wood and Coney Shaw,in Stonebridge and Ley; in the fields that flit by, worshipping onlythe swift dark woods, the down’s allegiantoak, and beech, and chestnut - saved by speedeach timei turn intothe ceaseless haze. ON BIRLING HILL, JUNE 1978 8 nowthe cool weaveswhite; the high dayends; the ridgesimplifies; the downlandtightens – a narrow gate,darkly green - trees opento an ageless sky; a time for nightjars, nightingales, sparrowhawks; and i amwashed away. TROTTISCLIFFE, JUNE 1978 9 this is a roadfor sunday walkers,wanderlusterswho go just so far,their communion curtailedby an absence of magic, fitted inbetween reading the papersand lunch, as is customary now. THE SNODLAND TO BIRLING ROAD, JUNE 1978 10 clouds shift; over the hillthe moon swells, the grass,dark this side,lights up - ignites a sudden thoroughfareshowing me the way,night by night,as i cycle sectionsof the old pilgrim road, all difficulties shattered, past fields of clover, cowslip;past Blackbusshe, Badgells Wood, past the Battle of Britain cross,