Sight And Vision. Poem by Michael Walker

('Mine eyes have seen the glory/ of the coming of the Lord'.
'The Battle Hymn Of The Republic'. Julia Ward Howe 1819-1910) .

My eyes have seen a slice of life in the world
and I have been blessed by beautiful landscapes
like the English countryside in the Midlands,
which affected me, on British Rail, like a sedative.
I learned to ski with French friends on some mountain
near Grenoble. There were still traces of the 1968 Winter Olympics
in the air and conversations in the city when I lived there.
On a T.G.V. train, I saw the rolling vineyards, olive groves
and the startling bright lavender fields of Provence,
loveliest of regions in France. On a tour, we stopped at Lauterbrunnen, a place of deep valleys between soaring peaks,
and we rode the steep cable car up a mountain slope,
then a ski lift chair over a vast, deep chasm,
where I was afraid to look down.Thus we went from Schlegel to Schilthorn.
The Ghan took me across the endless, lonely Outback of Australia.
Like Elijah at Horeb, I had glimpsed the glory of the Lord in the world.

-22/ 23 July,2019