I need to ease the itch of wordsthat wake me up at night,to sing in a different languagewith imagery and bite. I love to linger in poems whereno other poet has been yet,to feel a smile inside myself when other people get it. The poetichor of a poemcan drive me to distraction,like spring blossom dancingor […]
Tag: NaPoWriMo
Hejira
When the wanderer returns,what does she bring you?The skull of a bald eaglepicked clean, white and flightless.You call it Icarus,and wax rolls down like tearsas she writes you epic songsabout the refuge of the roads,and you think she’s finally home,but her mind is constantlyon travelling, travelling, travelling,a personal odyssey,not a false alarm. Kim M. Russell, […]
Cyclorama
Nature creates her own panoramicmural on the inner surface of my mind,and I am immersed in a manicexplosion of life in forest, garden, orchard,overflowing with the language of spring.It is no April Fool’s trick.A tunnel of branches,punctuated with lime green buds,leads me into the wonder of Mother Earth,a cyclorama of birth and rebirth. Kim M. […]
Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer
She was a woman painted in oilagainst a glittering of gold leaf,one of a number of beautiful,wealthy, bourgeois Viennese.She became sacred and magical,posed on a golden chair, mergingwith the golden geometricalpatterns of her dress, almost fadinginto the canvas, not theatricalbut melancholic and aloof,one could say vulnerableamong triangles, eggs and eyes. Kim M. Russell, 31st March […]
Medusa at the Supermarket
A hiss of hairuncoilsas I avert my stare,lowering turquoiseeyelids, mascaracoated lashes brushingmy pale powdered skin.I’m in the fruit section;with one hand I caressa pomegranate,with the other I pushback the stray curl.A couple and their little girlknock me with a trolley, unawareof me standing there,the darkest sunglasses pushedback on my head. I peerat their shopping, turn […]
Albatross
It’s a ghost in the night that keeps me awakewith whispering, muttering, sighing,and nudges in my poetic ribs.It pokes me with imageryand ties me up in allegoryuntil I reach for notebook and pen. It’s a ghost in the early morning, a wispof verse draped across my aching neck,a metaphoric albatrosschecking rhymes, ensuringenjambment and caesura makesense, […]
Seven
Seven linen shirts spun from nettles and sewn with blistered fingers.Seven white wings thrumming overhead, returning from winter wastes. Seven brothers searching for a blistered sister.Kim M. Russell, 25th April 2024 Image from Birmingham Museums Trust on Unsplash On the 25th day of Na/GloPoWriMo, I have no idea what the prompt is at NaPoWriMo as […]
Putting Pen to Paper
It’s happened again!I don’t know if it’s the penor the paper, but there are blotsand a swarm of purple spotsof ink where there should bewords. Or maybe it’s me. Changing the cartridge to bluedidn’t help, so it’s not the huethat’s causing the kerfuffle. I got up and filled the kettleto make myself a cup of […]
Bathing in Green
Drab khaki workaday realities disappear,become green bubbles in a flood of birdsong, and the garden is bathed in a green mere,viridescent ripples echoing all summer long. Green creeps from grass to leaf to tree, alongeach branch, farther than any wings can reach, over the top of the green-swathed beechand curly willow, from which a sole foliole, […]
A Call to Wise Women
Misunderstood throughout historyyou were tortured, drowned, burntand now, amid the intensityof climate change, plague and war,you have seen humankind at its worst. Forget the shamans,Mentors and Chirons,all male, muscle-bound,bristling with testosterone. We need you wise women,you Earth mothers who listento sky, air and soil beneath your feet,the quickening of the seasons’ beat.You understand the textures […]
writing in north norfolk 