Ode to June

Rejoice summer is upon us

Season of watchfulness as conflict grows,
June’s long stasis after long toil.
The world tilts, the sun ascends,
days lengthen, we gain a little time.
Shadows stretch to end our days,
statues touch, companions once again.
Yesterday seems dim, the present dimmer,
it’s easier to forget an Empire’s sins.
All seems fecund at this soporific hour.
Echoes stretch the dove's mellow sound.
Summer starts to dry and crack the ground.

On the cricket pitch, slant shadows fall,
a willow bat cracks on a leather ball.
The last man out, ‘How's That’, the bowler calls.
While Band Stand music glides the breeze,
sickly sweet with mawkish British tunes,
from times past that never were,
but in this hiatus may seem true.
Nostalgia beguiles us with an easy view.
All summers pass and are forever lost.
Peace is grasped and flies from our hands. 
Lost opportunities that we never knew.

Nearby piglets snuffle under forest litter,
squabbling over what is best to pick, 
they garner waste amongst the furrows,
and scatter anxious at the merest click.
Above swallows scythe and scoop the air, 
for their harvest of insects in mid-flight.
They consider how long before they leave
for southern skies, beyond Saharan sand.
All rulers pass. All reigns are finite.
Hurrah for common wealth. A hollow sound.
Dusk falls into a darkness that is profound.