Down the lane towards the river, branches touch their fingertips together, a leafy tunnel to catch a breeze while I listen for drumrolls from the trees to announce the annual rollercoaster, the reappearance of the spotted woodpecker. It’s already May and I haven’t heard him yet, he must be still selecting the most perfect of […]
Tag: Meeting the Bar
A Love Story (for bewildered girls)
After tomorrow, Saturday will unfurl in a gathering light: the beginning of the world in the middle of the night. There are faces in the water inside my head. I collect postcards from no man’s land that no one’s ever read. That’s how I live now, all alone in a house of sand and fog. […]
Early Rising
It’s four o’clock and it’s still dark outside, but blackbird chorus glimmers gently through the curtains gap. The window’s open wide and I can smell the chlorophyll, the dew, the dreamlike whiff of rain-soaked earth, and you asleep beside me, unaware of dawn: late risers hold morn’s moody light in scorn. Kim M. Russell, 9th […]
Restricted View
From the window and in the confines of the garden, I watch spring advance. Willow buds and almost-blossoms dance on the breeze, promising abundance yet to come. High above in the heavens are black smudges of distant ravens, harbingers let loose among vernal festivities. Stuck alone within these walls, but blessed with flowers, hedgerows and […]
Returning
In thick dark clusters, swallows skim the lake, reflections on the water shimmer clear. It seems as if the day will never break; in thick dark clusters, swallows skim the lake. I am returning too, to past mistakes I left behind with sadness, guilt and fear. In thick dark clusters swallows skim the lake; reflections […]
Nothing Short of Dismal
Everything is packed up ready to leave for the last time on a dark and dismal February day as the spring tide roars on the other side of the dunes waiting to devour the coast the fields the villages drown the towns and rampage in the cities and you say “Let’s go to the pub […]
Golden Hour
Winter sun slants low, cold but golden. Shadows overflow field edges, ditches and hedges, while dusty light glows in the windows of the ancient church and on the walls of the old barn, amber as the eyes of an owl. Kim M. Russell, 30th January 2020 My response to dVerse Poets Pub Meeting the Bar: […]
A Welcome Pause after December Rain
At the window, I watch a sparrow strip berries from the hedgerow. The magpie has ceased its chatter, contemplating things that matter before giving its opinions on the day. And now the sparrow has flown away. Except for a cat that gently purrs, I sit here at my desk alone, my fingers chilled to the […]
dVerse Christmas Gifts
Merry Christmas, aged librarian, your gift is wrapped in rosemary and thyme to protect your memories from mould and dust and enhance your sparkling metaphor and rhyme. This Christmas gift, Boris, is wrapped in a hanky; we can’t afford wrapping, so please don’t be cranky. We need all our money to rescue the country from […]
winter woodland
now is the time to explore you in misty light so low you become one inky shadow birch, ash, beech and oak let go of leafy glamour long ago abandoning piles of copper and gold now your copses are barefaced and bold your glimmering gnarly branches hold mulchy aromas of moss and fungus I long […]
writing in north norfolk 