Just south of Nash Street
lies an eye-straight road –
not laid by bent-to Romans
or rutted under lost pilgrims’ carts
but a later by-way pegged
between tool-twisted turns
of fleece-carding pricking wires
nailed to long-paced posts
Untouched oaks claim sunlight
in their overhead boundary
Their bare roots act as hazards
for my blind spot boots
which then slip on acorn grit –
that loosely rolled resurfacing
of brittle spawned shells
under emptied boughs
All found-hushes are lost
to door slams of a far off shotgun
At a saturated junction
unknown mushrooms stand
as if randomly placed bollards –
circles of tipped fragile caps
standing more connected
to this land than ourselves
We take a hard turn
to find – again – our east
to leave that subsoil route –
to tread on returning home tarmac