RANUNCULUS

Wm. setting off for Yorkshire,
cold pork in his pockets for dinner, Dorothy,
heartbroken, walking beside the rippled lake
until her mind feels calm again. The crab apple

coming into blossom, the new houses
she tries to juggle from her sight
looking towards Rydale Mount, a yellow flower
she hadn't seen before: a type of ranunculus.

She writes it in her journal, background detail
for another of his poems. I look ranunculus up,
lulled by the straight lines, the steady columns
of strange words blossoming into sense.

(Inspired by Dorothy Wordsworth's Grasmere Journals, 1800 -1803)