25 JUNE 1988, Page 41

May Day

The blackbirds sound alarm. I penetrate The evening garden, scare off thieving magpies.

Then hear from deep indoors not apposite Rossini but unearthly notes of Bach.

O cello that refused to sound in Spain!

What strangeness art desires mankind to feel, And which a slippered artist even tries To recreate from pottering around his real Estate. I envy the spite that stemmed from plain Oppression; for it seems in this late day Gestural merely to support the prey More point in lonely music, harmless times, A season when it's never truly dark.

Action and dream, the rivals of our rhymes!