Its Colour

When you need to see something

The sky can’t be relied upon. Alone

It can look bald, and cluttered when

It’s stained by cloud or Gothic spire-junk.

So much lies in the colour.

One will do.


Sunsets pink and orange like so many boiled sweets

Shining and gloating that they’ve been sucked, no,

We can surely do without them.

Thin grey – well I like its touch,

It treats the wounds of thirst and tousles you.

But no, the artist’s tint lies in the sleeve of Marie-Louise.


Who is Marie-Louise? you may well ask, and does she

Go to St Hughs or Hildas? I don’t know, no, no,

I think she was probably home-schooled,

At some period prior to the flourishing

Of Anthony van Dyck, and arranged

Her blue-grey-mauve-radiant sleeve specially.


But it doesn’t last for very long, soon formalised

Until oversung twilight drapes black wood

And yellow stone, firm colours, Baltic flag.

Her gaze was vacant, no doubt. His was too,

Maybe. He might have been bought by the crinoline

Or perhaps Marie was clothed with Dutch sky.