Elizabeth the Queen Mother

We shift in our new age, not yet at ease,

Torn already and not yet mended -

And your face turns to us from the last,

Memories played out across the screen

As if you were letting us into your dreams

Of a country much younger, crouched under

fire,

And then grown older, the world reaching in.

We head out, into uncertain Easter sun.

This is not mourning, but seeing clearly

The play of the future on the busy sea,

And beneath it, as beneath the new violets

Early and determined across the downs,

The remembered past, bearing our journey,

Remade forever, like the bright line of the cliffs.

Written on Isle of Wight, Easter 2002