A boozy bumblebee flewfrom May blossom drenched with dewand alighted on the ledgenear a blooming hawthorn hedge.After a dour start to spring,flirtatious buds are burstingand daisies dance in the grass. Insects are parched for sweet sipsof perfumed pollen from lipsof wayward woodbine flowerstumbling from bushy bowers.A bevy of bees in Maywill be worth a heap […]
Tag: Meeting the Bar
Children of the Brambles
Thorny limbs snatch at naked skinon the twilit forest path; glancingright and left, we seek knots of berries,black and shiny as jet, followingbrimstone and comma butterfliesthat drift like graceful ballet dancersarrayed in spectacular sunset hues. We dodge wasps weaving among spursand landing on fruit that bursts with juice;pick flies and spiders from the clusters,brush cobwebs […]
At last
April has arrived and we can open windows,breathe in grass-green scent and offer our skinto the sun. Daily walks are more comfortable,less chance of slipping; still we go slowly, handin hand, step to step, grinning at yellow facesof daffodils and primroses frilling up the verges.The piebald horse is at the top of the paddock.He shoves […]
A Whale’s Lament
I thought that once my shadowed dorsal bentthrough undulations, swimming would be spent;descendants bask in waters far from me.I’m a menopausal hundred-year-old granny. The ocean sparkles glisten off my back,as I pick at barnacles and bladder wrack.I birthed my last calf back when I was thirty –I’m a menopausal hundred-year-old granny. I’m an awkward Orca […]
Just Wondering
I often wondered how life might have been growing up asAlice.That was a name and an adventure I admired when I wasa child.Would I have been a girl who followed rabbits, met queens,consumedpotions and cake, and wasn’t afraid ofmagic?Or would I eventually have lost my head? Iwonder. Kim M. Russell, 6th March 2025 It’s the […]
Madrigal Muse
A ripple stream flowed steadfastly through snowand came out on the other side of spring,its bubbles lit by sunshine, brightly sparkling. A faithful friend, in winter it was slow,a muse on chilly days while walking;a ripple stream flowed steadfastly through snowand came out on the other side of spring. My lover waits down where the […]
Sparrows in the Garden
As light returns, in dozing green,never a sparrow to be seen. Never in tangles of rusty fernsnor hedges rich with pungent tannincurled with smoke where bonfires burnin dozing green, as light returns. Outside the window, on fence and ledge,some chase each other in the hedge,or hide and seek in the curly willow.Too small to see, they’re […]
After the first step into the New Year
“we write past, present and futurefind possibilities in wordsbut we cannot swim like dolphinsor swoop and dive like birds” from ‘Being Human’ by Kim M. Russell I couldn’t wait for the end of itafter so much worry and disenchantment,and longed to say goodbye to itall year long. Planets out of alignment,illness took the shine off […]
November Umbrage
Suspicious of a sunny dayas autumn’s glow begins to fade,I resent the early twilight.I doubt the early morning frost,the crunch of leaves the wind has tossed,despise the temperature at night.Although snowflakes give me a chill,their sparkles still give me a thrill,but I fear deep blankets of white. Kim M. Russell, 28th November 2024 Image by […]
On the Wings of a Northern Nanny
It starts with skitter of claw and whirr of wing,a battalion of ragged cormorants wrestling wild,ends with a sudden crunch like bones or antlers. With a sense of being elf-shot – sleet’s sharp sting –we cling together, yet unreconciledwith nature hurling branches, bowling boulders. There’s devastation all along the windinghomeward path, up past the church, […]
