21 DECEMBER 1985, Page 60

Tunes

Five-foot spanners solid as bells at dawn.

A run of thirty-two spanners, graded sizes Like visible chimes, four octaves Of shining spanners ready with graded notes, Music in the machine, tools like tuning-forks; The mechanic's jingling bag like a doctor's satchel, Cross between a physician and a piano-tuner, Tuning the great engines In shaped explosions scaled to utility music To dispose their power in harmonies, A cross between an orchestra and an ordnance.

The spirit that fits its body perfectly Manifests a little always above the skin Like a dew, or golden dust, Or like the sheen of oil over this humming engine.

A man sweating his soul out on a golf-course; The dew, the soul of the green; Music is suddenly there, like dew on grass, Like bells that hang all night and in the dawn light Throw out their sharp tunes in scales of glitter.

Peter Redgrove