Weir Wood: A Distant Prospect
By Jeff Gallagher
(Weir Wood is a Sussex reservoir)
Poussin has installed two shepherds
by the picnic bench, gazing on a scene
created by familiar palettes.
The water is Corot’s, turning grey
as the days grow short, and hardening
into a glass for our reflection.
Turner’s thumb has smudged tiny craft
that bob beneath white shapes
carefully cut out by Matisse.
Constable’s trees, still in leaf, stand
peripheral, flecked and speckled
by the movement of unseen birds.
The fields, by Hodgkin, are a vivid green
overlaid with the scummy browns
of an unofficial public right of way.
Beneath the flaking clouds, Monet’s
Woman With A Parasol calls to her dog
and steps serenely on a cowpat.
Nash had a bash at the pylons, though
in the end the gig was offered to
the Central Electricity Generating Board.
And Magritte admitted defeat when asked
to record a Mesolithic valley as
a forest of surfboards and ducks.
Ahead, unknown artists in aeroplanes
distort perspective, their white trails
taking endless lines for a walk.
And behind us, we hear Caravaggio
on a motorbike, speeding down the road
and picking a fight with the sky.