The Gate
 
With the light in his eyes and the horse
 Lounging and swishing at the edge of the wood
 He climbs to a bar and gazes from Yeoford to Neopardy,
 A four year old face beside the hedge's unfurled hood,
 His look vague over the grass-green sea
 Like a dog's riddling air for scents' strength and source.
 
‘Come down! Come and play!’ Voices invite
Small as the insects’ in the afternoon heat.
‘No, because at the moment I am standing on a gate.’ Then,
As if some others were drowned, he half turns to repeat
‘I am standing on a gate’ . . . again
At the beck of Charles-The-Horse and distant light
 
In the glades of the thousand-headed forest
Busy once more among the silent trees
Standing on the gate of the moment.
 
Jerome Betts

If you have any thoughts on this poem,  Jerome Betts   would be pleased to hear them.