Three Poems by Richard Hawtree

 

Gravadlax

 

The nights were short and the drinks were long

in the suburb without an urbs.

Every parking space reached a state of grace

when the gravadlax was served.

 

The potholes sang and the glasses rang

to the roll of bin on kerb,

while the golf course lay en déshabillé

in the suburb without an urbs.

 

The joy that springs from suburban things

lies buried in the stars,

as they spin away with the dawning day

from this broken world of ours.

 

Now and Then

 

‘… the feerce water streams beateth down, now and then, our walls and town, which we do daily build.’   The mayor of Cork, 1548

 

Cork’s river Lee floods, now and then,

from Crosse’s Green to Grand Parade

where, idling by the Beamish brewery,

she styles up Christchurch crypt with Viking combs

layering quays with unkempt memory.

 

With her now-and-then flow bold as a legatee

reaching for her father’s silvered bones

spinning along in their reliquary.

 

Canadian Maple

 

In a paradise of footpaths,

castellated brick reflects

the casually intimate.

 

A Canadian maple flames,

walls amplify the walkers’ talk:

‘I lived in Paris for two months,

 

then war came.’ On all sides a courtesy

treasured by autumnal generations,

victorious beneath the pathless sky.

 

Richard Hawtree's poems have appeared in: The Stinging Fly, Banshee, The High Window and The Honest Ulsterman. His collection The Night I Spoke Irish in Surrey was published by Dempsey and Windle in 2019.