Sometimes, there is no spring

Sometimes, there is no spring
Sometimes, there is only
the shivering scarves
and the slow-black
of the funeral march.

Still willow tree people
           bowed,
in the chill-white church;
smeared mirror memories
distorted,
as the now is too much
for clear
and clean reflections.

Sometimes, there is no spring
Sometimes, there is only
the fingerprint-pink
of final embraces
and farewells.

Layer on
Layer on
Layer of wedding cake marks
something borrowed,
something bruise-blue,
Spirit rituals
haunt a love new.

Sometimes, the hope-green
of new flowers doesn’t break through
the brambles and barren soil
of the better left forgotten,
And sometimes, there is no spring

Josh Brittain

Josh Brittain is a third-year Creative Writing student originally from Torquay but is now living in York. He wrote this poem thinking about a funeral he is writing about in his dissertation and the end of a recent relationship. Linguistically, he took inspiration from the opening of Dylan Thomas’ Under Milk Wood. 

Photo by Ricardo Gomez Angel on Unsplash