THE GENERATOR
There is something really rather wonderful in the woodshed.
Sunlight shafts and the scent of wood,
A cider press
And flakes of bark that have been gathered into sacks
And stored 'till we need kindling for next winter's fires.
There are galleon windows in the woodshed,
Stacked, opaque, leaded and bowed
To the shape of the side of a ship;
Saved from a time when many were found
But the stained glass ones were sold.
Swallows nest in the woodshed;
Swooping in to stop in the beams
For only the tiniest part of a second,
Then sweeping back out.
With a slurring, flurring beat of the wings
They pass the machine that lives on a stand
Of brick and cement
Hidden behind the woodshed door.
The generator; that is the truly wonderful thing in the woodshed.
Not very large, about the size of a bed,
Green.
It rests through the day, self contained,
Crouched in the way a cow lies in grass
Patiently waiting for night.
Then, when the flight of swallows is losing its frantic pace
And the blackbird is losing some of its sorrow
And the slugs and the snails are preparing themselves
For their night-time assault on the cabbages,
Then, only then, does the generator come into its own
In the woodshed.
For then it supplies us with light,
Gradually building its rip-roaring power,
Sending a strengthening life through the wire
So the light comes on slowly,
Glowly, first very lowly,
Imperceptibly reaching the moment
When all is bright
And the courtyard is filled with the comforting roar
Of the generator
That lives in the wonderful woodshed
