Ogre

In the kingdom of Bryneich
Verging on a muddy crook of Coquet
A dice of houses cast with clay and sheepdung
Through a soup of starlit peatsmoke
Gradually emerges as we descend

Bring the goose my child!
I carve a notch into the squirming post
It smells like a smithy
Hurry now and drink the bowl before it congeals

There comes frightful news from town
Of great evil abound
The heartbroken potter's idiot boy was snatched from the speltfield
Scouring a fortnight in the hills
All they found, pointing from a sett, a small grey hand

Tie the goats to my cot
With tansy rags their faces cover
Push straws into the windows
Damp the coals, and bar the door with hornbeam limb

Blinding colours leap
Along bemirrored tower walls
Stretching as far as the eye can see

I am woke in icy beads
By a clamour coming from the broadbeans
The snapping of stems and a foul-smelling bloom
Paralysed I watch my child's breath
Glide like a jellyfish across the black morning

When the Sun is climbing
We'll find the harrow smothered in slime
When the Sun is climbing
We'll put it in the dog's noses

When the Sun is climbing
We'll break upon the heath
When the Sun is climbing
We'll dash across the Ringing Meadow

When the Sun is climbing
We'll weather a storm of living needles
When the Sun is climbing
We'll tarry by the Pool of Plenty

When the Sun is climbing
We'll hurry down the Valley of Eagles
When the Sun is climbing
We'll hear the distance of the North Sea

When the Sun is dying
We'll cross the Causeway of No Memory
When the Sun is dying
Our trees will billow into dunes

When the Sun is dying
We'll wade around the shoreline
When the Sun is dying
The algae as a nap of fire

When the Sun is dying
Below the surface of the water
When the Sun is dying
In the face of the cliff a ghastly doorway

When the Sun is dying
We'll pitch a tent of pigskin on the beach
When the Sun is dying
The ebbing tide will soon reveal its secrets