The Friday Poem

Image- courtesy of Christine Laennec

Winter Lights Within  

You say:
It’s so dark and dreich here
So far north
So far away

I say:  but let me show you
The soft gentle darkness
Of my street in mid-winter.
We can walk past tea-time scenes
Behind a shifting tracery of branches.
There’s my neighbour waving to us
From her golden doorway
A moment’s greeting
Before the clicking lock
Returns her to the warmth of the fire.

Here are roses blooming
In the stained-glass windows:
Curving leaves that twine and glow
Within frames of curving granite.
And can you see, along the terrace,
The delicate chain of lamplight?
Its pattern, pinned to earth,
Is echoed by the stars.

Where I lived before this
It’s true that dusk came later
But for all the winter daylight
There was darkness in my heart.

~Christine Laennec~

(Published in Pushing Out the Boat, issue 9, 2010, p. 41.)

Read more of Christine’s writing at  http://christinelaennec.co.uk/