Tracks and Mineshafts
Peter Riley
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Every faint gesture rebounds on us
leaving a vacant hollow in the world:
possible, unfulfilled acts embedded
in the tissue, growth points too late –
the land is riddled with failed promises
and premature returns.
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He picks his way among hollows and craters,
earth funnels of abandoned mineshafts,
bracken fields, rose bushes gone wild,
dry voices ringing in the air
exhortations to labour and be patient –
derelict electricity sheds, tram lines
sunk into gravel, overgrassed courts;
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he passes rows of empty cottages, hospice inmates,
boarded-up shops and brick scattered streets,
chapels and hermitages in stony wastes
all empty, sites of reflex impact,
inhabitants blasted to non-entity.
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For Amy Cutler
