I wrote this in a season of life when it felt hard to engage in the world. At the time, I had a studio at an arts space called Old Jet in the Suffolk countryside, and I picked up a copy of The Wind in The Willows in the kitchen which inspired this poem.

Like mole, busy in his burrow
I feel the call of Spring
And it’s divine discontent

So I say “Bother!” and
And head upwards
With grubby snout

To dance in the light
With the tremor-makers
Of the world above

And on the edge of glory
I hesitate…
And wish for gravity

To pull me back
To quiet passages
Where I can chastise the worms

But the rising sap
And the warming sun
And the tumult of song

Call to me
Of a deeper need
To belong

To see and
Be seen
After the shadows

Alex Menhams 2024
Photo by Nikola Tomasic