The shades and tones of changing foliage remind me of bottles displayed behind a bar: the honeypot tint of mottled leaves; the richness of wild cherry and dogwood dyed in aubergine; maples softly glowing crimson; hawthorn and blackthorn flaming fervently among the beery browns. Raise a glass to autumn drinkers huddled around the open fire […]
Category: Poems
Tasting Books
‘Alex- A few moments of reading pleasure in return for an evening of sensual delights. Denis October Bacchanalia 1994’ Found on the flyleaf of The Physiology of Taste – Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin Spidery writing offers pleasure on the pages of a mildewed book discovered in an antiquarian book stall by the Seine. Taste is something […]
Navigating November
there is no dawn or dusk no proper time of day like the depths of the dark forest we navigate November running fingers on bark and fungus to find north we lean in close listening for sap to rise and bubble signs that queuing behind winter is spring Kim M. Russell, 15th November 2022 Free […]
Wood Witch
The lonely lady peruses the history of rainy summers shining through tree stump rings. She traces bark with gnarled fingers, tastes the snow of past winters, listens to whispered stories shelved for centuries in the library of knowledge stored in every tree, shrub and hedge. The forest shares its secrets, its treasures, and its warnings […]
Still Embraced by Summer
this summer’s overtopped itself with fern and willowherb below a tree a grassy lea with fern and willowherb it’s hard to find the perfect verb at least it is for me when winter comes and no bees hum at least it is for me most summer’s overdressed in green and days are always warm with […]
Kindly Moon
At twilight, there she is, an old friend rising in the east and setting in the west, above fields shorn with harvest. She’s on the look-out for geese complaining after thousands of miles flight. And she smiles, this kindly moon, as they cross her face, knowing they have no perception of space, just a birds-eye […]
The Fervour of Fermentation
The seasonal fermentation of my October passion becomes more fervent, and I am more observant as her larder, fully stocked, is temporarily unlocked: piles of acorns underfoot; hedges full of autumn fruit; birches seed and conkers brown, sycamore helicopters tumble down; and, multiplied by recent rain that’s made the grasses green again, hordes of mushrooms […]
A Deceit of Lapwings
Singing softly as they zig-zag simple songs to a two-note tune, silhouetted lapwing deceit syncopated in trickery. Peewits flash and turn, black and white, peeling from sky, they start to dive, peacocking with aerobatics, peaking with their springtime antics. Kim M. Russell, 6th October 2022 This Thursday, Grace is our host for the dVerse Poets […]
Hung Up and Washed Out
I am hung up on the news, even though I turned it off several times today, but it won’t go away, someone else keeps turning it back on. Nothing is black and white, the news is all in colour now, apocalyptic visions, forests of coffins, dogs of war are breeding instant gore, violence and harbingers […]
Contentment
In quiet moments, I backtrack to childhood, when life wasn’t packed with worries and responsibilities. I’d stare for hours at cloudy skies; watch a bird catch a worm, see it wriggle and squirm; a beetle on its way somewhere. Contented child without a care. Kim M. Russell, 4th October 2022 It’s Quadrille Monday at the […]
writing in north norfolk 