The Dark and the Light

 

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Nine Standards Rigg, K. Manwaring 2019

Dark is My Shadow

 

Dark is the shadow

that passes over the fields

like radar.

Dark is the beck,

foaming like Theakstons

with phosphates.

Dark is the peat hag,

the loam of millennia

dripping and deceptive.

And dark is my shadow

carried before me like

a wet rucksack.

Yet all is held by the light,

which embraces each shadow

with the whole of life.

 

Kevan Manwaring, 17 June,

crossing Nine Standards Rigg

 

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Yorkshire Dales, K. Manwaring, 2019

 

Limelight

 

Glint of sunlight on limestone wall,

a line of white against

the deep green –

rough edge rhyming

with the ragged fleece

of ewe and lambs

in their brand new coats.

This is high dry country

where dramas of light

and dark are played out

in silent operas

of clouds and hills.

The audience response,

the slightest sussuration,

a bleat and a peewit’s

tralee.

 

Kevan Manwaring, 18 June

Kirkby Stephen to Shap