These days the mornings grow darker and darker,
and I fear they’re growing harder too,
though the sun may sometimes consent to shine
and the small birds sing Te Deums in the trees;
still, the gathering clouds are deeper than doubt,
and the shadows cast are chillier and longer;
while the earth grumbles and stirs awake
as though some sleeping Titan quakes.
Perhaps I am old and disposed to sadness
since old age is the season for weeping;
a butterfly but crosses my path
and my heart will break in my boots;
but I think instead it is something else,
something like a loss of fellow feeling
when the tribe no longer will carry its sick
but leaves them by the wayside to die.
© Abigail Wyatt
Disability tests 'sending sick and disabled back to work'
Abigail is one of the three founding members of the Red River Poets. The latter will be appearing at the Heartlands Project in Cornwall, 29th September, as part of 100 Thousand Poets for Change.
