Rounded In The Ways Of Life Poem by Mark Heathcote

Cowslips grow along a winding woodland stream
in this here amphitheatre-they're-all that's left
to show me-it's-spring and I'm not alone in the arc
to show me there is light in my heart that's not all dark
to show me it's not just a cold, selfish, blaspheme
that I should feel so empty and crazy and bereft.

These here cowslips like stars were once part of me
smooth-soft-stones rudimentarily, chosen
for earth rounded in the ways of life. They became
part of me, their feet in crystals of quiet ice-made-a-claim
I impugned ahead the flowing dream, wintery
-dreams that-if-I could, I would dream unfrozen.

Where they've gone, I never chased-or-followed
they slipped beneath the ground, and-were-swallowed;
I walked in search past the sullen woodland pool
whose prism mirror was more mystically in tune.
Its purple depths were only ankle-depth shallow
but its reach was to my soul more than a shadow.

And cold as it seems, I felt myself here at home
looking halve crazed into its watery loam
I wish to see its waters move from the stillest thought
I gazed for fish-and-still, but there was nought-
no echo of life did discern in its face
would speak with me, but its presence shone; a holy place.
The lore I followed without a footprint trace.