Bearing Fruit
The earth took me from my long sleep
something bout the rhythm of it invited dance;
the way the rowan staggered swiftly upward
while the oak stood unmoving in its monstrous splendour.
The bright movement of the sparrows was delicious;
I couldn’t help but echo their fleetness
as I wandered south to where the valley cupped its hands in prayer.
You can pray all you like
there’s no getting rid of me. Back in the day
you had a name for me that was all throat; I
wonder what you would call me now. Man can’t sing like
he used to. Into your streets I become a shadow, a suggestion
a rising of the hair on your arms, a warning to your errant kids.
Where’s my song? When did you forget how to be properly scared?
I know what I do to you. You become rabbits
all your nicenesses gone, lost in the scuffle of feet
and the whites of your eyes. Where are your words
when you first see me?
I’ll wait till half-light; you’ll see the way I stare
the way a skull does. I command the countryside
and I won’t be settled till the harvest’s half done.
How’d you like that?
Me, I don’t think you can bear the thought that
someone knows better than you, and I do! I promise
the things I’ve seen, the years I’ve lived, I can’t even remember
when the jig first started, only that there was
warmth and wine. The earth gave me breath and
then it gave me you; and in the spring I rise
like fog and fill the hills with quiet fear and
listen to the wind-borne birdsong.
Daisy Harris
Daisy Harris Poetry 