When the wanderer returns,what does she bring you?The skull of a bald eaglepicked clean, white and flightless.You call it Icarus,and wax rolls down like tearsas she writes you epic songsabout the refuge of the roads,and you think she’s finally home,but her mind is constantlyon travelling, travelling, travelling,a personal odyssey,not a false alarm. Kim M. Russell, […]
Category: Poems Inspired by Artists, Music and Other Writers
Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer
She was a woman painted in oilagainst a glittering of gold leaf,one of a number of beautiful,wealthy, bourgeois Viennese.She became sacred and magical,posed on a golden chair, mergingwith the golden geometricalpatterns of her dress, almost fadinginto the canvas, not theatricalbut melancholic and aloof,one could say vulnerableamong triangles, eggs and eyes. Kim M. Russell, 31st March […]
Stormy Sea
It’s a battle between umber cloudin a fiery orange and indigo skyand the raging sea crownedwith frosty foam – gods tossingboats between them like toys. And where are the buoys,the safe places for those thrownoverboard? Who know what liesbeneath the waves, what monsterscircle? Or are the monsters aboardthe ships, ignoring the gods,believing that they are […]
Heart-Shaped Spud
I give you a humble potato,imperfect and caked in soil,ready to be bathed in clear water,it’s knobbles caressed and cherished. So versatile is the potato,it can be whatever you will,roasted, mashed, fried. To you I offera dish of Dauphinoise – embellished with garlic and cream, sliced potatocheesy with Gruyere, sprinkled with dill,slow-cooked until crispy on […]
Where or When
Things past and presentare linked by a thread and Iam in the middle holding it all together: my little cat and my witch’s hat,all muted colours, greys and browns. The doors are locked,the table is bare,and I can’t let goto read the notepinned to the wall. I would love to ridea little white horsepast a […]
My Heart Remembers
“The heart remembers everything it loved and gave away,everything it lost and found again, and everyoneit loved, the heart cannot forget.” from ‘What the Heart Cannot Forget’ by Joyce Sutphen Memories of your gentle faceare sketchedon my heart,like paths across the landscape. The shape of your lipsis etchedinto my genealogy. The frost of that morning […]
Wordstone
I’m not a light-footed scampereron windswept beaches, however I’m like a ruddy turnstone, my ageingskin freckled and pebbled, turning words like stones and discoveringthe nourishment that I’m seeking: words and phrases, deep as the sea;a pile of eureka poems to satisfy me. Kim M. Russell, 7th January 2024 Ruddy turnstone, photographed by Michael Sammut For […]
Blue Period
I was a quiet, sensitive teenager, who felt songs deeply, like tattoos. I’d never been to sea or travelled abroad, and longed to sail away. But I let someone underneath my skin, where there was an empty space to fill. That was where I went wrong, trusting someone who didn’t have my best interests at […]
Nature’s Not So Well Kept Secret
Behind brief, flickering shadows,the invisible bones of nature glow. Autumn sun burnishes leaves,like gun smoke their incense breathes. For centuries men have used their mindsto construct walls of different kinds to repel enemies and protecttheir property, kin and the rich select. But nature has a single secret,one she’s never very well kept: winter threatens humans […]
Lady with a Parrot
Her life is mirrored in the bird:grey with a touch of crimsonin the parrot’s crest and feather tips,and her unsmiling lips. Red’s lucky for some,but she is a captive,tamed and longing to flybeyond blue curtains to sky and leaves, green as the bowl,from which she sips her tea,and green as her envyof the parrot’s wings. […]
writing in north norfolk 