The Spinning Poem by Giles Watson

The Spinning



It’s not a slowing down so much as a stretching out
Of what might be last moments. No one shouts.
You notice how the centripetal force folds your thoughts
Outwards, like an opening rose. You detach from things
As mystics do – if only for one long instant – remember
The scenes that put you here: how you used to clamber
Up the gum-tree in the garden, and lurched but never fell;
How drawing lent you patience and birds taught you to feel;
How you held your baby swaddled and watched a gush of blood;
How you lay when you were older in the meadow by the bridge
With the rabbits creeping nearer – how her arm was cool
Against your cheek, and you nestled closer. She didn’t recoil;
You did no more to encroach. It seems important now your soul
Has gone back into the spinning: you’re made of leaves and soil
That hurl against a windscreen. There is no flesh, or form,
But the bleeding at that birth, and the coolness of her arm.

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Giles Watson

Giles Watson

Southampton
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