Fresh Plaster

The smell of fresh plaster,

the seamless poured floor;

the swallows from the rafters

flying in and out the door.

The buildings now fulfilling,

a producing little brood.

Already there are gardens,

already there is food.

Already on these acres

there's gravel and there's lawn.

Only early days,

and the fresh plaster smell is gone.

(We waited through a lot of lockdowns to visit our friends at their new home. It was a series of ruins when we saw it in 2019, with our friends living in a mobile home on site. Fast-forward to July 2021 and we thought we'd arrived at the wrong house).

All The Same

Flatbed trailers clatter by,

silage through brambled ditch.

We watch out and identify

the haylage and the baleage.

A four-hour call of everything,

a fifteen-year rectifier.

Lola still threatening

the big move back to Glanmire.

All the time, all that changed

all the same, just re-arranged.

Silk Cut Purple stolen days

tossed and stored, just like the hay.