The Road North

THE ROAD NORTH

I’ve not been here before and won’t stay.
The track winds north through the mountains
and I want to press on in the sunshine.
Not sure where I’ll stay, doesn’t much matter
as at last I’m beginning to see
patches of snow round the peaks.

From the middle of a lake, beyond reeds
a score of geese rise together,
their wing beats and throaty exhalations
like gunshots amplifying the silence.
No, that’s wrong! ‘Nothing can come of nothing’.
It’s the startle of sound within silence.

I suppose I’d been thinking of our quarrel,
how estrangement can grow unheeded:
signs of distress discounted,
endearments seldom spoken, rarely felt.
The unsaid, its silent amplification,
the road north.