Ashridge

In Ashridge we froze, as through its rows of hypnotic beeches
A deer trod stealthily, russet coat blurring into reddening
leaves
For a moment I thought it was a lion, that as leeches
suck poisoned blood from veins, the silence that breathes
Whispering magic into its swaying branches, to float
Like dandelion seeds in its autumn-scented air,
Had somehow born us on a droplet of rain or a mote,
Of dust, to a distant land where the sun's sudden glare
Might reveal a tiger, its body shredded by shadow,
Or the footprints of a mammoth, pummeled in the mud
And like a leech had sucked stale boredom away, to show
What lies beyond. Yet it was a deer of mere mortal blood
And beyond the trees and the windswept hills
Where shreds of clouds ripple in shimmering rills
It was time to go to work.