The ways – clockwise or anti? Tradition
dictates anti. The times? The times are lost
like Fleetwith Pike in cloud so cloudy it’s more
like a representation of itself.
But why the need to count? When here I feel
as ageless as the water, the shore, the tales
illustrating themselves in the spaces between
the trees of Burtness Wood. But Peggy’s Bridge,
that cluster of firs in Warnscale Bottom –
they remind me to imagine myself
in a Caspar Friedrich – a parody
of the first time years ago. It’s half past
the hour at the too cheerily named bridge,
but oils take time and it’s hard to get me to budge.