The river's not itself, has swelled like a notion
astonishing this valley. It sheens brownly
though much is urgent where the channel was.
The current's momentary nets drag winter
sea-ward like a discredited regime.
Beneath this footbridge sedges swirl like clothes,
a magpie hitches downstream on a branch
and glassy surfaces are bearing off
the former sky in its white tattered shirt.
Excitements, rumours, speaking everywhere:
trees, like believers, lean against the brunt:
mirrors glitter where council parks had been:
swallows dart and stop like fish, scoop up
invisible lives from the shallows: through the handrail
the flood's power hums into my hand.
I climb high onto the bank to stand with Spring,
that old charisma, that artist obsessed by yellow,
dabbing its mustard weed, its dandelion
into the tuck and ripple of these slopes.
The grasses gesture their attention, thistles
nod their cockades, buttercups unfurl
minute umbrellas, fennel smokes greenly
and sweet pea flickers a purple groundfire.
Yes! If language lives here, it is archaic,
a presences earlier than the naming thought,
spontaneous tremor along the nerve, not meant
for ear or eye, but exclaiming the good! the ah!
A green accord, it flows both in and out,
as the speckled bird carolling on the branch,
or the daisy's gesture, raising its sunny face
for sun to admire, announce the one effect
and make their own on this day of innocent timing.
So the river splays into the south,
making of what were pastures a brassy shim.
A warming breeze, arriving like a rapture,
fish-scales the long pools where the flood has been.