Granular light and the grainy wall
of the house opposite the dining room window
fuse somehow in the ebb and flow, call and recall
of afternoon, slow sips of black coffee, that indigo

shadow of flowerpot and flowerpot and sky
in and beyond the back garden and its empty washing line.
Just beyond the trees the river’s grey
shimmers perhaps with coming rain.

When we woke this morning the shipping forecast
looked ahead to dark gales in the Bristol Channel,
each fallen leaf trembling with autumn light a strange blast
of colour changed and changing, endless and final.