Perfect Day by John Ransley July2013
Perfect Day
Sunday morning in Vincent
ruminating on old loves
smoking French beedies in le jardin
loose white clothing, sudoko and summer sunlight
Wind in the trees and tiny birds twittering (they invented it first)
distant haze and misty mountains – crows cawing
screams from a hedge getting a short-back-and-sides
grumbling from an angry wheelbarrow
Leela dashes across the lawn but the lizard
makes it up the 18th century wall
le chat that squeaks chews grass tips
and continues her careful investigation of the undergrowth
Purple pois de senteurs and tall slender daisies
violent red roses and yellow-flowered bouillon blane
pale yellow butterflies blessing the flowers
quickly followed by a brace of black bees
Church tower electrically bells the hours
two frisky stallions whisk away flies
snorting and stamping and watching the road
for passersby with apples
Vast unseen landscapes of monoculture crops
have got the village surrounded, no pasaran …
today no giant tractors traverse the narrow streets
French law forbids working on Sundays
a birthday surprise on your doorstep
maman calls from the south – yogis on the way
bulletin XVI despatched to mes amies Anglais
a beautiful reply from Kathy in Australia
I CAUGHT this morning morning’s minion,
kingdom of daylight’s dauphin,
dapple-dawn-drawn Falcon, in his riding
Of the rolling level underneath him steady air, and striding
High there, how he rung upon the rein of a wimpling wing
In his ecstasy! *
‘…such a perfect day
I’m glad I spent it with you’ (Lou Reed)
Kundan
Vincent
7 July 2013
*Gerard Manley Hopkins, The Windhover