Dead Season
In a dead season,
The child with his hoop
Scudding
Down empty dust-blown streets;
Spinning top
Whipped crazily clockwise,
Hours and years
Whirled ticking into silence;
In cobbled gutter
Thumb flicks marbles,
Hand turns to show
Scabbed sore knuckles ....
Healed now, as from the fireside
I watch wind thrash among leafless poplars;
Suddenly I see him
Pause by the gate – look up;
I knock on the window,
But he cannot hear,
Immersed out there
In his long-dead season.
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