3 AUGUST 1991, Page 30

`the brighter visions brought music . . . Ivor Gurney

Lapwings in display salute the earth they're swishing to with a three quarter roll list as a fencer's wrist; and it's in that image your song takes me - above all, the cadence.

Like a master swordsman allowing an exhibition bout you play me along to it seems a climax, I think I'm up with you then with a dazzling feint, a last disarming flourish, naked to beauty you have my heart, stroking it with a blade of grass.

Geoffrey Holloway