Progress Report

My need has frayed with time; you said it would. It has; I can walk again across the flood Of gold sil popples on the straw-gold hills Under a deep Californian sky that expels All truant clouds; watch squads of cattle graze By the radio-telescope; blue-battered jays Flash raucous squaking by my swivelling head While squirrels sine-wave past over the dead Oak-leaves, and not miss you_although I may Admit that near the telescope yesterday By a small bushcovered gully I blundered on Five golden fox-cubs playing in the sun And wished you had been there to see them play; But that I only mention by the way.