The Annunciation: a spring hailstorm;He is risen;Rite of spring;Last post

The Annunciation: a spring hailstorm

(in memoriam MLH 2011–15)

It was sudden,

this hail, shrouding Spring

fields white as pain;

a shock, a sting,

Winter again?

© Laurentia Johns OSB

He is risen

I went seeking Byland

but found instead

two deer leaping –

twin alleluias –

full of grace and

almost asking:

‘Why seek the living

among the dead?’

Rite of spring

And then, onto this almost

finished canvas

flew swallows,

as if to dot the ‘i’ and cross

the ‘t’ of victory,

your finished symphony.

What do they bring

to this rite of spring

that hasn’t now been said

in the Father’s serene brightness,

and the Son’s new greenness?

Perhaps, the Holy Spirit’s quickness

that marks the difference

‘twixt living and dead.

Last post

(in memoriam AJ & JAJ)

Just last week they were there,

a purple-headed troop,

a quiet triumph of the forest floor,

a rising fifth piercing the air

in plain, arresting beauty;

square-stemmed, labiate.

Could it be Ground Ivy?

I looked it up –

didn’t google –

the white-striped lip

removed all doubt:

this was a clump of Bugle,

churned up now by

clumsy diggers’ jaws

so the blooms lie dead in rows,

like Graves’ remembered heroes,

recorded here as more

than vegetation:

a very present absence,

hope’s registration.