Dancing Dust |
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Poems by Mollie Caird (1922-2000) |
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Winter in the Parks |
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Winter-locked are the elms in the park Where the nuthatch spirals the granite bark, And the hoary hawthorns stand all day Blossomed with frosts instead of may. Bonneted, booted, the children go, Their footsteps squeak on the frozen snow, Disturbing the huddled daylight owl And the shivering wren on the alder bole. Skates on the river hiss and ring Where dons delight to dip in spring, And ladies tread a steel-shod measure On the sacred surface of Parsons’ Pleasure. Under the skaters, far below, Roofed with the ice and the wind-blown snow, Sluggish and cold and dark and deep The summer Cherwell lies asleep. Oxford Times, 1 February 1963 The Dancing Dust and other poems, 1983 |