Blood orange moon, gunmetal streaked
With menacing cloud.
Lightening flashes cut the curtains
Momentarily illuminating the room.
Ordinance crashing thunder groans,
Explodes and roars.
Blustery gusts of wind whistle while
Rain, nail sharp, torrential, brutal,
Beats relentlessly on window and roof.
I can’t sleep.
As time passes
Rumbles turn to distant muffled drums,
Moon cloud cloaked,
Deepest darkness envelops my world.
Somnolent silence returns
Until fingers of opalescent dawn
Crawl across the fields
Banishing the morning star.
I awake to a hushed new day.
Another night; calm, quiet.
Liquid limpid moonlight
Washes waving barley.
Sloughing, sighing, rippling
Silvered fields billow and surge.
A silent spectral owl glides
Above whispering reeds
As sheep silent, ghostly,
Lie beneath star pricked ancient skies.
Jack and his wagon eternally
Ride the darkness
Until nascent dawn
Brings the light.
theruralwriterblog 
Thanks for this, Pat. I missed most of your reading of this poem earlier today as I had gone out of the room so it is nice to read it in its entirety. Thank you, too, for your explanation of “Jack and his wagon”. I had not heard of this before. Is it a Sussex expression?
Ann S.
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Thank you for your comment Ann – much appreciated. I think it is a Sussex expression but i have also heard the expression used on Romney Marsh. It also appears in a slightly different form in Sheila Kaye-Smith’s Little England.
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A beautiful, evocative poem – words and phrases packed with meaning and description! Thank you for this Ruralwriter!
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Thank you for your comment Teresa – always very much appreciated. Glad you liked the poem.
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