What ifa green snakehas lived inthe green grass all these years, despite changes to climate, hidden in the richness of its own colour,even whenfamine struck? Emerald,undulating and coiling but never striking, living its best life while Paddy is celebrated – he didn’t do a proper job. Perhaps he knew,thought he’d test faith, spice up mythology […]
Category: Poems
A poem to sum up my feelings in this post.
Apflod*
* Anglo-Saxon word for low tide. What impressed our ancestors about the rocky coast?Those wet rocks, barnacled and slick with weed?The immense power of waves that boastas they crash onto the shore, pounding screefrom cliffs to sand? And here I stand, watching gulls circle above;below, the colours of the wild sea are mixedas if a […]
Paradiddle
He plays a paradiddle on the drumswhile his lover sleeps. The room is dim, no heat at the ending of the day,although the weather has stayed dry. She really wanted to go for a walk,but he focused on his drumsticks, work took precedence, with a new world tour.She turned her back on him, a tear […]
non-sentences
less of the gloom a sunny afternoonno relentless windy roar no torrential downpourrandom non-sentences unwhole elevations of the soulre-arrangement of the mind’s furniture fragmented but purepeacefully ferment a magical momentconjuration of verse poetic conjuressmall comforts in lyrical spaces phrasal interfacesKim M. Russell, 3rd March 2026 Melissa is hosting the dVerse Poets Pub Tuesday Poetics this […]
Why?
Why do honeysuckle blooms spill their fragrance in the night? When morning sun creeps between slats in shutters, whyare dust motes ignited like fireworks? And later, the lens of day’s diminishing light freezes in the finalblaze of sunset, capturing a heron’s trailing gangly legs. Why does spring arrive in starts and stops like a dripping […]
The Non-Taste of Tea
On my lapI feel a warm cat,and in my handmy favourite cupof cranberry and raspberry. But there is nofruity burst on the tongue,just heat in my mouththat no longer spreadsto the cockles of my heart.No heightening of the senses.No calm. I hear myself breathe.I watch a poem bloom from the leaves. Kim M. Russell, 12th […]
Losing the Sounds of Spring
Vowels ploughed into other: opened ground.The mildest February for twenty yearsIs mist bands over furrows, a deep no soundVulnerable to distant gargling tractors. Seamus Heaney In the north, the Plough is ridden by the moonand frost continues to clench the earth.On this early morning walk there are no words,no lines from puffs of frozen […]
Stolen by the Breeze
On stone pillows, the dead sleep soundly.but the cicada’s seventeen sad syllablesare immediately stolen by the breeze. In the morning quiet of the cemetery,the haiku master writes a eulogy, whileon stone pillows, the dead sleep soundly. Lost in his task, he dips his brushin a pot of black ink, and he hears nothingbut the cicada’s […]
Likened to Icy Auroras
In the wild configurationof a Norfolk night,where weathersmells like peat and moss, we are at peace— Until we are wokenby snow-light through blinds,dazzling our eyes,everything needled with ice as if speckled with stars. So we venture outto stare at the whiteness—instead we are metwith watermelon sky turning colours like a kaleidoscope. In that momentwe are […]
Thirty-Three Years On
Thirty-three years have passed in theblink of an eye and the tasteof those first kisses still lingers, ofsea salt on the wind that tied ustogether. I remember theexcitement, the spice,the excitement ofbeing us. Can you remember therolling waves and their hollers,the crash of the rollers andsuck of the ebb? I still feel thepull, the melodies […]
writing in north norfolk 