General all over Ireland
 
dirty as bedsheets
torn tattered to corners.
and wrapped around lamp posts
and cracked garden walls:
 
the snow dropped three
days ago; now
nothing's left but the cold
and an all over ashiness
of aged granite architecture
and dusty wrought iron.
there's a moment in falling –
a beauty and the silence –
the muting of palm-
down guitar strings.
 
but here it falls thick
for perhaps just
a day or two;
then weeks
of wet pavements
which ring like a bell
against traffic.
 
I walk to the shop
for a bottle of wine,
a carton of milk
and some chocolate.
the pavement is brittle,
the evening air
teeth. my hands
in my pockets
curl like crows
under wings against rain.