Defeat

Sun in short supply, drawn sky and dim,
grey light… My desk a mass of papers, all
without much meaning now the past has proved
the present to be traitor, all my sense
of purpose and proportion false. The years
have taken all the urgency away,
dulled every colour, every hope. What’s left
is just so many words in fading fields
of darkish squiggles, written long ago
when I still thought I had some words to say,
now merging into smudges, like a line
of telegraph poles on a rainy day