Scene from an older world than ours
a moment in time preserved forever
linear, stripped of its third dimension
sunset sky, church, churchyard, snow
now snared, their borders hemmed
in four straight edges of the frame
where space once, would for ever
have gone on in all directions.
The spire, the door, the windows
even headstones pointing up
into the sky’s enormous clouds
of more importance than the church
and that is how it should be—
for god is there.
But people, would be lonely
in this captive frame, in this sad
deserted place where night’s
already evident upon the snow
where even day is leaving,
its vermillion sunset contre-jour
more evidenced in shadows
than in light—
surprising that this serendip
would ever have known sun
for light and colour cannot quell
the teeming-sweep of melancholy.
Should it, in a kindness,
on some drear winter’s afternoon,
be taken from its frame, set down, set free
when its time could once again
complete its destiny
and where its space could once again
forever reach in all directions?
