tilted parasol we sip our summer cocktail two straws in one glass Kim M. Russell, 2nd June 2019 My response to Carpe Diem #1694 summer cocktails This month’s Haiku Kai is all about summer love, and today the theme is ‘summer cocktails’.
Song of the Ornery Oak
I am an old oak bowed by years, knee-deep in my fractured limbs, leafless, bare of bark and splintered, destroyed by lightning in a storm. I am an old oak fraught with scars, and here you are with saw and axe already stained with another tree’s sap – I’ve anchored my roots to thwart your […]
Two Hearts – a tanka suite
walking together in a meadow of yellow buttery cowslips filled with the humming of bees honey-sweet as a first kiss a crown of petals daisy-chained by our fingers dusty with pollen trails on the summer breeze snags in overhanging leaves knee-deep in grasses on the edge of the meadow our fingertips touch with an exchange […]
A Pair of (Still) Blue Eyes – final draft
They have retained their lustre, yet it is dark beneath closed lids. They filter light to conjure colour in dialogue with the brain, resonant as Shakespearean actors. Tired after years of looking and seeing beyond words, they require lenses, windows on blurry landscapes and distorted Giacometti figures. They are prickling thistles, friable pillows of delicate […]
A Pair of (Still) Blue Eyes
We have retained our lustre, no vile jellies, and yet we know darkness. We orbs are oratory with the resonance of a Shakespearean player. We have a direct line to the brain, filtering light to conjure colour. But we need lenses, windows on blurry landscapes, distorted Giacometti figures, aliens in our owner’s ocular world. We […]
Poetry Pea Podcast: Something a little naughty
Although I haven’t been able to do any writing recently, I have a slightly erotic haiku in the latest Poetry Pea Podcast Series 2 Episode 12: Something a little naughty. You can listen to the podcast as well as read the notes to accompany it on the Poetry Pea website.
From Fret to Regret
My teenage passion was fingering frets, twisting my fingers into chords and positions, resonating the sound hole of a Yamaha. When telephone wire silhouettes strung across yellow and orange sunsets resemble strings, I regret giving up my dream of playing like Williams or Bream. Kim M. Russell, 17th June 2019 My poem for dVerse Poets […]
Eggs and Other Things in Your Basket
From the steps at city hall, the market square resembles a tin of sweet wrappers, brightly striped in sunshine and glistening in rain. A walk between the stalls makes me sea-sick: I roll down the lurching incline, a sometime sailor, bantering with Norwich traders over fresh fruit, fish and flowers; exotic spices, eggs and cheese; […]
Night Sounds
Above the garden, diamond sparkles fill the sky and the moon is a thin slice of lemon light. An owl floats, a slow ghost fading into shadows. Even the breeze is soundless. I’m beginning to feel that I’m alone on this planet, when far away an interrupted cry causes a rip in the silence – […]
Cruel Paean
For the past few weeks I’d caught it echoing across the village, a lazy iambic chant. When you heard it too, we smiled together at the rare sound of the cuckoo’s two-note song. We forgot that it’s a cold-hearted parasite, hatched and nurtured to the tune of another bird’s lullaby. We were oblivious to its […]
writing in north norfolk 