Jeff Guess

Walking Away It is eighteen years ago, almost to the day – A sunny day with leaves just turning, The touch-lines new-ruled – since I watched you play Your first game of football, then, like a satellite Wrenched from its orbit, go drifting away Behind a scatter of boys. I can see You walking away from me towards the school With the pathos of a half-fledged thing set free Into a wilderness, the gait of one Who finds no path where the path should be. That hesitant figure, eddyin

The Rainwalkers An old man whose black face shines golden-brown as wet pebbles under the streetlamp, is walking two mongrel dogs of dis-proportionate size, in the rain, in the relaxed early-evening avenue. The small sleek one wants to stop, docile to the imploring soul of the trash basket, but the young tall curly one wants to walk on; the glistening sidewalk entices him to arcane happenings. Increasing rain. The old bareheaded man smiles and grumbles to himself. The lights c

Who’s Who A shilling life will give you all the facts: How Father beat him, how he ran away, What were the struggles of his youth, what acts Made him the greatest figure of his day: Of how he fought, fished, hunted, worked all night, Though giddy, climbed new mountains; named a sea: Some of the last researchers even write Love made him weep his pints like you and me. With all his honours on, he sighed for one Who, say astonished critics, lived at home; Did little jobs about t

Tintern Abbey Lines Composed a Few Miles above Tintern Abbey, On Revisiting the Banks of the Wye during a Tour. July 13, 1798 (Lines 1-59) Five years have past; five summers, with the length Of five long winters! and again I hear These waters, rolling from their mountain-springs With a soft inland murmur.—Once again Do I behold these steep and lofty cliffs, That on a wild secluded scene impress Thoughts of more deep seclusion; and connect The landscape with the quiet of the s

(From) The Dead - The Dubliners A few light taps upon the pane made him turn to the window. It had begun to snow again. He watched sleepily the flakes, silver and dark, falling obliquely against the lamplight. The time had come for him to set out on his journey westward. Yes, the newspapers were right: snow was general all over Ireland. It was falling on every part of the dark central plain, on the treeless hills, falling softly upon the Bog of Allen and, farther westward, so

Song at the Beginning of Autumn Now watch this autumn that arrives In smells, all looks like summer still; Colours are quite unchanged, the air On green and white serenely thrives. Heavy the trees with growth and full The fields. Flowers flourish everywhere. Proust who collected time within A child’s cake would understand The ambiguity of this — Summer still raging while a thin Column of smoke stirs from the land Proving that autumn gropes for us. But every season is a kind O

Robin Adair What's this dull town to me? Robin's not near: What was't I wish'd to see? What wish'd to hear? Where's all the joy and mirth, Made this town a heaven on earth? Oh! they're all fled with thee, Robin Adair. Long I ne'er saw thee, love, Robin Adair; Still I prayed for thee, love, Robin Adair; When thou wert far at sea, Many made love to me, But still I thought on thee, Robin Adair! Welcome on shore again, Robin Adair! Welcome once more again, Robin Adair! I feel thy

Daybreak: the household slept. I rose, blessed by the sun. A horny fiend, I crept out with my father's gun. Let him dream of a child obedient, angel-mind- old no-sayer, robbed of power by sleep. I knew my prize who swooped home at this hour with day-light riddled eyes to his place on a high beam in our old stables, to dream light's useless time away. I stood, holding my breath, in urine-scented hay, master of life and death, a wisp-haired judge whose law would punish beak and

The End of the Weekend A dying firelight slides along the quirt Of the cast iron cowboy where he leans Against my father's books. The lariat Whirls into darkness. My girl in skin tight jeans Fingers a page of Captain Marriat Inviting insolent shadows to her shirt. We rise together to the second floor. Outside, across the lake, an endless wind Whips against the headstones of the dead and wails In the trees for all who have and have not sinned. She rubs against me and I feel he

Slips The studied poverty of a moon roof, The earthenware of dairies cooled by apple trees, The apple tree that makes the whitest wash . . . But I forget names, remembering them wrongly Where they touch upon another name, A town in France like a woman’s Christian name. My childhood is preserved as a nation’s history, My favourite fairy tales the shells Leased by the hermit crab. I see my grandmother’s death as a piece of ice, My mother’s slimness restored to her, My own key s