OUT IN THE WOODS

One of the bits of The Wind in the Willows I really like is Mole getting lost in the wild woods. I don't know why - it's always just been a bit of a picture of something grand and scary and beautiful and lonesome, all at the same time.

Ratty finds him and they do eventually find Badger's hole, which is warm and cosy, in the end, and it's all quite lovely. For me though, there's something... what's the word... resonant about being lost in the woods. So I wrote a quick poem about it. It doesn't go anywhere, doesn't make a point, doesn't have anything particular to say - it's just a kind of a thought, a picture, really I suppose. Don't read anything into it.

Out In The Woods

Out in the woods
Where the west wind blows
And the gnarled old trees
In the darkness grow
With the rustled pines
And the creaking bark
In the shadowlands
Of the falling dark

Out in the woods
Where the monsters cry
And the dryads weep
At their lullaby
Where the silver moon
In her darkness weaves
Such a slender tale
Through the fallen leaves

Out in the woods
Where the tawny sings
And the west wind blows
Through the world of kings
Out in the woods
With the rough-cut breeze
And the shadowed bark
Of those gnarled old trees