Provision

The irritations of comfort—

I visit as they rebuild the house

from within: whitening, straightening,

bracing the chimney-breast edges

and forcing warmth, dryness

and windows with views into

the cottage below canal-level.

For yes, there’s a canal, bringing

cold reflections almost to the door,

and beyond it the main line to Manchester,

its grid of gantries pale

against the upland and the sky;

there’s a towpath pub, where the red-

haired old landlady

brings up the beer from the cellar slowly

in a jug: there’s a chapel

next door to the cottage, set up

with a false front and a real

boiler-house, and—

rest, my mind—nearby there’s

a small haulage contractor’s yard.

Everything’s turned up here, except

a certain complete cast-iron

housefront, preserved and pinned

to a blank wall in Ottawa.

This comfort

beckons. It won’t do. It beckons.

Driving steadily through rain in

a watertight car with the wipers going.

It won’t do. It beckons.

Copyright Credit: Roy Fisher, “Provision” from Selected Poems, published by Flood Editions. Copyright © 2010 by Roy Fisher. Reprinted by permission of Bloodaxe Books Ltd. (Great Britain).

Source: Selected Poems (Flood Editions, 2010)