back

ROSAMUND STANFORD
lessnessness

i'm grateful like a christian
for the bumps of earth
under my slippers
 the sheep i'm stood up on
 laid its skin down
 and its locks
 to be footpadding
 felting of ground
 softed

telling me
  lower
  it's lower
  the pace

  the pace is lower

walk on my ears
the bumps
  the bumps are telling me

  still
  be still
in the heave and hive
 still
as the queen   laying

crawl the slow-roll bank
  feel
feel the matted matting
of end-of-winter bits
  broken-off msuku grass
  dust-silted

roll   till a stone
or a rock
heaves up
  under my shoulder blade

and through the valley
the wind
  from its rushing tear
stops   all of a sudden.