An Ill Wind

Cherry

By Silver Spun Sand

Fri, 20 Nov 2015
  • 2307 reads
6 comments
 
Wishing his life away...he knew that, but this was it; winter had, finally,
arrived.  He felt content now... lulled by the rain thrumming on leaded lights
as he dozed by a wood-stove’s amber glow,
 
Rain turned to snow – flakes that padded soft on the window;
relishing, as he did,  hibernal, aguish afternoons, life moved 
at a slower pace, a good excuse to stay inside – days shortened, less 
demanding, sought little of his time, in return –  cocooned him. 
 
Cupped hand to ear as mice scuffed the wainscot while he puffed 
on briarwood pipe – piecing together, as best he could, fragments 
of thought, like pieces of an ill-fitting jigsaw. 
 
Pyjama-clad, stumbles outside. Beneath his bare feet, feels 
the earthworms  rise  like the stirring of new life inside a womb.
Trudges to his greenhouse...spring wouldn’t be long now. Was
winter really ending so soon? 
 
But that’s what happens when one gets old he mused Time flies,
don’t they say? Opens an old pack of seeds; sweetcorn – his  late wife’s
favourite and he must plant them...now.  
 
No time to waste...but the soil – stubborn, unforgiving, unyielding –
nigh on frozen,  dead-set to force his repentance for its untimely reveille.
 
His back aches, and his body shakes...keeping perfect time 
with an easterly stirs the petals on his cream-cupped hellebores;
Christmas roses – she always used to call them.  His precious seeds
all but duly sown...  
 
dusk fast falling, till comes that timeless moment twixt  tawnies’ 
muted calls, and the opening, dazzling bars of a starlight extravaganza.
 
In the fragile light of morning they find him...a smile on his lips...blue
as  shadows on the snow of a spade’s steely shaft, and stiff as last spring's catkins
still on the tree, as cold, so cold,  blows the wind.
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Comments

Submitted by Rhiannonw on

Now where did that intriguing tale come from?
I thought 'piecing together, as best he could, fragments  of thought, like pieces of an ill-fitting jigsaw' was so very  apposite for how the mind can get so muddled and do such things that seem so incomprehensible. Some lovely descriptions piled in. Line 5 - did you mean 'anguish'? Rhiannon

 

Submitted by Silver Spun Sand on

Hello there, Rhiannon.  You and your eagle eye again.  Actually, I'm really pleased you asked that question.  In fact, 'aguish' is a medieval word, with its derivation in a fever which was rife at the time, then known as 'the ague'.  Since those days the word has been given a broader meaning, i.e. 'having the qualities of an 'ague',  as in  chilly, shivering, shaking, etc.  New words are such fun, I always find...a bit like finding a heart-shaped stone on a beach.

As to where the poem came from, there was news in our local paper last year of an elderly lady who had passed away in her garden, having been there overnight, poor soul in freezing temperatures, and it's something I often think about with the colder weather coming along.

So pleased you enjoyed, and thanks for noticing my 'new' wordsmiley

Tina

 

Submitted by Rhiannonw on

Oh, I should have thought of that, now I have a new word!

Concerning elderly confusion, my mother-in-law has just been telling her grandson who'd come for a couple of days, a long story about going to New York on a 4 deck boat in her 20s or earlier (ie 1930s). My husband has certainly never heard of such an event, and she does seem to dream and mix up memories with dreams (films, books??) and wake up convinced they are real events and sounds very confident about things that haven't happened. Rhiannon

 

Submitted by Silver Spun Sand on

Hello again, Rhiannon.  Thought it might please you...wordsmith that you aresmiley

Such a poignant story about your mother-in-law.  Unfortunately I know exactly where you are coming from, as they say.  My husband, now, bless him, has great difficulty determining fact from fiction, sometimes (especially in the evenings). Some of it is down the drugs he has to take for his Parkinson's, but not all.

Many thanks for sharing.

Tina

 

Submitted by Jane Hyphen on

Love this, 'winter ending so soon'. I can imagine how he feels; New Year for breakfast, Easter for lunch, Christmas for dinner. Time can fly and drag all at the same time. I do hope that elderly lady was doing something nice in her garden - how sad! A bit of confusion is surely the logical conclusion of accumulating so many memories and the, sometimes turbulent, emotions which accompany them.

 

Submitted by Silver Spun Sand on

Jane, how well sum up the situation...must be the writer in you.smiley  Many thanks for your thoughts on this poem, and as for the lady who inspired it...I hope so, too.

Tina