Duck Pond

 

Deep in the duck pond

Where the green weed grows

And the straw is yellow

Next to the track,

Where the ivy creeps beneath the Alder and Willow

Which brush their stems and stem their flow back

Deep in the duck pond

Where the green weed grows

Ducks fight and splash about

It could be a war or a turn about

Or a pair of lovers in a spate

One who loves, the other who hates

But deep in the duck pond

They see to their deed

Where the willow weeps in the green duck weed

Down in the duck pond,

Where fellows blow their horn

And the little spirited sprout

Sings for the sweet summer corn

While the West wind blows

Then across it the Easterly is torn

All along the deep duck pond

Where all the birds were born

Severed heads on severed spikes

All seem dead but go ask the tyke

Shadows shake in the shallows like

The deep duck pond

Of the bad old Pike

He swims about, he asks not twice

He sees a snout, then snaps his vice

And there he has you, pulls you down

Into the depths of the duck pond to drown

Where hell is a spirit on the water

And the wind chills the slender necks of swans

And the rails with the moor hens daughter

Falls to the pails and the sweet shorn sun

Where the kale sways in the shallows

And the bulrushes blow their seed

Deep as heartache over the water

Of the deep duck pond with the green duck weed