Ice Age Poem by Richard George

A thousand steps above the valley
April is winter:
But Offa's gale harangues me on,
Deafens misgiving.

Leaves of snow gather,
Shroud tracks with silence.
Retreating from safety,
I pad like Scott or Shackleton
And look back; lost.
In fog's winding-sheet, I stagger
But something guides me down along
Its blind man's stick; a hedgerow.

Here, the land remembers
Glaciers, dog-tooth rocks
Gouging geology.
Brambling birds busy me home
To Anno Domini.