I was out walking one showery October day and, finding myself some distance from home, realised to my dismay that the shower had changed character and become an icy downpour reinforced with sleet.
It put me in mind of the lethal hail of Norman arrows that Harold's army must have suffered on that momentous October day back in 1066.
OCTOBER RAIN
An aspen in a Norman wood
supplied the shaft.
A craftsman’s patience
straightened, seasoned,
then perfected
something far removed from nature,
shaped the taper, sealed it,
gently carved the narrow nock.
Fingers, that might pluck a lute
on fair-days, set to fletching:
grey-goose feathers,
resin gum,
fine thread of linen.
These would aid trajectory,
ensure fidelity of flight.
Lastly, a hand affixed with care
the arrowhead, the killing-piece,
fierce-furnace-forged
into a kind of bird-wing-shape
with pointed beak, as lethal as a battle-sword.
It would be one of many
that French archers took to English soil
to fly in flocks like starlings
over Hastings fields
and fall to earth like iron rain,
out of a grey October sky,
to pierce the fearful blue of Harold’s eye.
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