On Dartmoor
1. Princeton
Billowed mass of cloud door
light spilling
from its yellow threshold
onto the path before us
rising south and west
to the tor,
weather-messaged, Inca
asymmetrical
where wild ponies shelter
behind out of the wind
and a black foal approaches
close-up
to you, out of focus
in the lens.
To the true west a trail out
into open moor
the further landmass
dropping away, stepped
cliffs falling
to the far off
sea.
On our about-face
trek, the village
not so very far away:
a line of houses
on a climb northwest
the radio tower’s marker disappearing
into mist
and to the east, grey tall-
chimneyed prison buildings
circled with Victorian granite
(not razor wire-topped chain link).
Inmates unseen, unknown
inside that January sadness,
closeby to us on our wonder-eyed
first owning
of this wild expanse.
2. Corsham Hill
The oak
holding up its empty
candelabra
to the winter sky
on the middle wire
strung from the telephone pole
a robbin
chest throbbing-
sings
drops
disappears
under the mist-touched
brow
of the nearest up curve,
Corsham Hill.
Continuous this rise
of the moorland
and soft procession
of wind rain-saturated air,
overlapping
so I cannot make out
is it cloud
trailing down
or some not yet clearly back-lit
outcrop
reaching up?
The kissing touch persists
through late afternoon
through dusk,
and evening dark.
I really like the effectively spare descriptions of the landscape. Few words say a lot here. Thanks.
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Thank you David-I’m not terribly clued in to all the possibilities of interconnection through online, but
grateful to sense the web of kindred sensibilities.
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