Mark Goodwin - Lit Lichen, Tŷ Uchaf

we walk the track to Tŷ Uchaf

our Petzls solve
the dark around us so
we are surrounded by
a close cool bubble
of blue light

we are clothed
in a technological veil

we move
our bubble along so
keyhole sized portions
of a landscape repeatedly
develop and then
fade

away behind us and just

before Tŷ Uchaf
black & haw
-thorn forms spook
from inkiness into solidity
their plant-silence greets us

diode-lit lichen clings
tangled like fibrous silvery-green snow
to the convolutions
of their spikes & branches

it is a faint Christmas-ness
grown thick & Pagan

and balanced in the lichen’s
green rinds glistening droplets watch
like numerous mouse eyes

we turn
the key in Tŷ Uchaf’s lock
and we feel

in our minds behind
us (in the dark) the points
of thorns clogged
(or clothed?)
by frothy strands & splodges

of lichenous thoughts

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Mark Goodwin's first full collection, Else, was published by Shearsman in 2008. 'Lit Lichen, Tŷ Uchaf' is the first of five poems that Gists and Piths will be publishing over the next week or so.