Now the school's day (and night) is finally gone,
In dark echoing house I put on
My woollen coat and lead on dog
And touch the stained-glass door's fog;
I venture out of that old House I love
And feel the vapour rain I have sought
That wash and think away issues I had thought
To unknot in peace the problems now I loathe.
My dog and I walk in silent rain
For each of us live our own little game
And we walk 'long Somerton in gloom
Where darkness did isolation assume.
This shall now be my normal send-
A draw to the monstrous shady trees
And overlapping gloomy lights- both leave
Peace that someone enjoys only Dead.
First I pass that old dank field
Water-logged in rain, mud, and weeds that shield
What this darkly is, from change, and in rain's sound
This is where a ghostly home once stood aground.
No more will it change and in light find
Any comfort from its moonless dark,
And such lonely houses this field starts,
For haunted memories- everywhere- abide.
Along December ways, and December means,
The cycle is broken with such dark heaves,
And yet in the same city this night
Who cares for that boy for he's beyond rain's sight
Though it haze in the Ardoyne clusters too?
And still in some rooms trees awaken
The deadly night with fore-coming plans faking
This time known by the heathen's clue.
Next I cross that three-floored mansion, deplete,
Set forth, imposed, near the dark-mirrored street
And muddy lawns about magnificent long windows
Bringing darkness to dim darkness low.
This house I did wish to own in mind
Someday in all its inert presence there,
Yet find that now to changed eyes it stares,
And change of heart in nights like this, I find.
The silent vapour rain does haze around
Without, as these many magnificent houses, sound-
But this world does but consist of these
Far from the Ardoyne- as a vapour's breeze.
There, I heard of a thirteen year old
Whose late death made his fire burn out,
And what a curse Vitality is without doubt
In this desolate Age that money moulds.
Along deserted worlds, and deserted lanes
Of memories caught in the poet's frame
These sights do but keep their place,
And in every lamp-lit study still men pace
And every house set back from the road
Places itself in recalls of late
And all these, in December's fate,
Escalate lonely presence as empty abodes.
The Catholic church is at my path
And its gothic gloom gives feelings sad
Because it was the same when I was born
Before another therein was born,
And for that one I walk this lonely street;
There's the spot Devlin in his racing youth was stabbed:
He and the Ardoyne teen Death has had,
Faster than this hunter's plashing feet.
Across city lights and Ulster's grass,
One does grow in their casual pass,
Whilst here in concrete streets and concrete worlds
I do diminish in time's vortex swirled,
For they would not know Majesty colossal
Be a world they do not know
But enjoy the present's casual flow
And longer last their study fire's fossil.
Past remains as I trace younger steps.
So too this love be merely slept
Before reviving itself like a phoenix bird.
Yet the mansion curtains give no stir
Leaving the trees and the hazing song.
Alone this street and without you,
I can take these two teen ghosts few
And, for my comfort, acknowledge all as One are alone.
