My birthday bouquet, overa week old and wiltingin a shapely vaseof glass half-filledwith scummy water glintingin the sun.Flowers raise their headsin a last hurrahof purple and pale yellow,their brown-tinged leaves hangingover the lip of the vase–over like the birthday. Kim M. Russell, 11th June 2025 Over at What’s Going On? Susan is hosting with a […]
Tag: Mary Oliver
Giant
I’m trapped between mature queen beeches, beneath the litter of their crunchy mast. Their silver trunks are adorned with stag-horn lichen and bracket fungus, a tiny fairyland. Me, I’m a giant, one of a circle of stones haunting the landscape, a left-over from a long time ago. Sometimes the great bones of my life feel […]
A Blackened Sky
Clouds billowed thunderous greyabove charcoal stalks of heather. Trees held their breath all wind-filled day,browbeaten by the bullying weather. As if by lightning strike, a leafless oakexploded into jet-black blossoming: a magnanimous murder of crowsbroke from the darkness cawing, burst into the blackened sky,their sooty feathers spread and soaring. Kim M. Russell, 13th January 2021 […]
This Summer
I watched the movie of this summerfrom inside, shielded from the unrealityof vacant sunny days, no traffic noise,a drought of touch and laughter. I lived each day in the now,no plans for the after,uncertain if there would be any kind of future. And now, at the tail end of this summer,rain-diamonds decorate the windowpane,mornings are […]
After the Smog Came
Nobody listened to the warnings, so when it came, it was a shock. The atmosphere was so badly poisoned by toxic smog from burning forests, exhaust fumes and waste, it leaked into space and discoloured the face of the moon. It just disappeared. After a number of years, older children had forgotten about it and […]
A Frosty Night
On this frosty night, stars blow themselves to smither- eens and fall like feathers. Silvery hisses and splutters of white noise in my ears rush like the ocean on shingle, a symphony of moonlight, on this frosty night. Kim M. Russell, 19th January 2019 My response to Imaginary Garden with Real Toads Weekend Mini-Challenge: Mustn’t […]
The Hollow Sound of Winter
Geese fly overhead, chain-stitched in a skein by the beat of wings. The gaggle alights on a lazy wind, flowing like water into the marshes, their harsh, hollow honks onomatopoeic echoes of winter past present future. Kim M. Russell, 26th July 2018 My poem for dVerse Poets Pub Open Link Night This Thursday I’m hosting […]
writing in north norfolk 