Two Poems

ABOVE THE ITCHEN VALLEY

Here we either fly,
sweeping over down after down
and with the domed clouds,
or are rooted to the earth
at our feet, turning over
a mountainous flint,
sliding from a fold
of its chalkface
to the great downs
of an August sky,
a smudge of blue smoke -
Southampton, and the sea.

Here are ragwort so hot
it hurts to look at them.
There a skyline of bales
...