Sheenagh Pugh: What If This Road

What if this road, that has held no surprises
these many years, decided not to go
home after all; what if it could turn
left or right with no more ado
than a kite-tail? What if its tarry skin
were like a long, supple bolt of cloth,
that is shaken and rolled out, and takes
a new shape from the contours beneath?
And if it chose to lay itself down
in a new way; around a blind corner,
across hills you must climb without knowing
what's on the other side; who would not hanker
to be going, at all risks? Who wants to know
a story's end, or where a road will go?

Sheenagh Pugh: Sometimes

Sometimes things don't go, after all, 

from bad to worse. Some years, muscadel 

faces down frost; green thrives; the crops don't fail. 

Sometimes a man aims high, and all goes well.  

A people sometimes will step back from war, 

elect an honest man, decide they care 

enough, that they can't leave some stranger poor. 

Some men become what they were born for.  

  

Sometimes our best intentions do not go 

amiss; sometimes we do as we meant to. 

The sun will sometimes melt a field of sorrow 

that seemed hard frozen; may it happen for you.