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 […]

Black Tulips

Glossy goblets in the florist’s shop, rare tulips, brimming with power and strength, constrained like Rilke’s panther, stained with the ink of witching hours. Oh, for a pot of midnight flowers, scented with soil, not a bouquet of beauties with stems cut and wilting in their pain, but petals of black velvet that bloom again […]

At Dawn

yoake ni arau tsuyude watashino ashisaichoubi at dawn I wash my feet with dew the longest day                              Yozakura at dawn the first pink flush of morning still bleary with sleep I wash my feet with dew cold and refreshing the fragrance of grass the longest day stretching to the horizon suffused with promise at dawn […]

Preparatory Sketch – a poem in Visual Verse

I’m happy to have started the poetic year with a poem in the January 2020  issue, Vol. 7, Chapter 3 of the online Visual Verse anthology. You can find my poem on page 27 or you can link directly to the poem, entitled ‘Preparatory Sketch’. Also linked to Poets and Storytellers United Writers’ Pantry.

Queen of Winter

Cailleach, the Celtic winter queen, atop the Cliffs of Moher, her domain the time from Samhainn to Bealltainn, strikes the ground with her frosty staff, freezing the tops of hill and mountain. From her creel drop curious stones carved with magic, the ancient bones of her husbands and her many children, promises of fertile field […]