23 JULY 2005, Page 33

The Weather

The cancelled games; the seaside holidays With only one short afternoon of sun; The ruined picnics or the wintry haze Of unrelenting drizzle . . . thus we run Down, like some incurable disease, The English weather. But oh the rainbows Crossing misted hills, the unrepeated skies, April rain, the moon on frost, autumnal trees, The perpetual green fields! As if God chose Somewhere to improvise; varieties Seldom predictable, with no extremes.

Such diverse constancy we might do well To emulate. From drab insistent dreams The awaited beauty casts the strongest spell.

When times are bleak, think of when the sun shone, Of black clouds clearing over deep mid-on.

Charles Chadwick