Pause For Poetry:
Michael Hawkes /79

Albatross

A poem by Michael Hawkes

I didn’t do the garden this year…
not expecting much to grow.
I fixed the gate to let it swing clear,
the lawn was much too long to mow.
Last year’s hay lays flat in places
with flowering weeds all poking through
and dandelions’ sunny faces
cover all the un-dug spaces
with their kind reminders
of all I didn’t do.

Beneath the blossoms of the apple
through the day long dappled light
I watch the wild things running rampant,
catch the hummingbirds in flight
feeling glad of my non-doing,
well content with all the being
bursting forth here in my sight.

With birdsong and the mumbling bees
the murmuring of alder trees
and lapping wavelets on the shore,
my present needs indeed are few.
The harmony of all of these
assures me that there’s little more
I ought or have to do.

With my feet up, heart at ease,
deeply breathing briny air,
adrift on vast un-travelled seas
I contemplate horizons there.
So no, I didn’t dig at all this year,
I knew somehow the albatross
was due to re-appear.

15/5/24 – Hawkes

Feature image:  Annie Spratt, Unsplash

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