Richard Hawtree  

Oxford, UK

 

Richard Hawtree’s poems have appeared in literary magazines including: The Stinging Fly, Banshee, SOUTH, The Honest Ulsterman, and The Blue Nib. His chapbook The Night I Spoke Irish in Surrey was published by Dempsey and Windle in 2019.

 

 

Poem completed 23^rd April 2020

 

Lilac and Brimstone

 

An apostrophe mourns against the fence

on a plaque beside C.S. Lewis’ grave;

a pitiless text exhorts the brave:

Men must endure their going hence.

 

No comfort here, and little sense

for those who slip through days of plague

or drink in Plato’s twilit cave,

scrabbling for a few last pence.

 

Must men endure their going hence,

accept a fate the stars once gave

while spring is darting out to save

this lilac and brimstone present tense?