Where we scratch and hack in the undergrowth.
Nature’s front line is well entrenched here,
In-grown and wiry with brambles and brash.
Ages running wild, seeding and shooting
At will, snagging, choking and smothering
Have toughened her. In self-strangling struggle
She scrabbles and claws her resistance –
A tortuous mesh of trip-lines, barbs for skin
And slips for boots in the mush underfoot.
Old, alone and confused, like a geriatric tramp
She bristles in layers of shredded sacking.
Let’s tease out her bits, put to the burning
Barrow-loads of combings; rake up the mess
On her breast, sticky with burrs and briars;
Open her up to the sun, re-stitch her
Seams in woven hedgerows, with patches of
Flowers fight back the years. Waken Beauty,
Give bees and butterflies her face to love
And we too will grow young with the work.
Julian Case