Angel Fragment
The red and pink hawthorn is flowering along the path beyond the playing fields. The children’s clothes seem to match, all blue cardigans one day, all red sweaters another. They are enclosed by the green space of the sward, their voices one monotonous burble of insular games.
The May is Paul’s Scarlet, mixed in with white ordinary trees. The scent is very wet and cloying. We do not bring the flowers indoors as it is unlucky.
One day I see angels walking between the may trees.They are clad in white, naturally, but otherwise they are not as expected; they are fearsome, cold and distant as though engaged with their own business.
I dream of a giant angel as big as the organ pipes in the church, he is fairly vengeful and not at all comforting.
I was going to be an angel in the school play but am ill with chicken pox or measles or mumps.
Later I sincerely regret not being able to wear my mother’s net curtains and feel cheated ever after.
Much later, I learn that William Blake saw angels in the trees on Peckham Rye, I kind of know that he probably did, having seen his vision of an alien species.
I have felt wings grow from my back on several occasions and felt the breeze from the unfurling of unseen feathers. I know the angels are very stern and have no sense of humour, maybe that is as well…
