“Uprooted”
‘You live in your bloody head far too much,’
said Dad, ‘get into the world; away from
all those damned books and fancy. We’re building
an orchard’ – in the eastern paddock where
we had hand-raised the winter orphaned lambs;
mothers frozen, exhausted after a
hard labour in the top field. I had seen
forty five saplings, their roots shivering
in the lazy Swale winds, lined up against
the Anderson; waiting for the cold kiss
of fresh dug loam. Petulant and without
the maternal warmth of the kitchen stove,
I stabbed at steeped turf with rusty auger,
making box string homes for stupid fucking
fruit trees. A bare smile passed as he saw pride –
unexpected – in my soil caked face. Arm
now slung round my shoulder, that brief look
hung like old telegraph wires; pregnant with
unseen information. Before the first shy
blossom showed, the farm had been sold
and developed. Box string starters for
stupid fucking people, unmoved by wild
romances of unruly North Riding
orchards; the beacon that called me home to
bitter Allerton wapentake winters.
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Will Vigar 
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