afterwards

snowdrops and old  tombstone

empty house
dust on the dressing table
cobwebs in her hair brush

 

yet more weather

reindeer plush and daffodils
Looks like rain, dear
No one who lives in the UK needs to be told that the weather continues unabated, and I can’t be the only one who’s thinking that surely now February is here we might expect some proper winter weather rather than all this wind and rain.

The phrase February fill dike came to mind. Googling it I found this article from the Guardian two years ago, which reports that “southern, central and eastern regions […] are teetering on the brink of drought”. It also says, somewhat surprisingly, that February tends to be one of the driest months of the year.

Not wanting to get political, I’ll just mention that I was told as a child that “bad governments bring bad weather.”

Well, whether drought or flood, we seem to have been having bad weather for years. The poem below was written in January 2001:
Continue reading “yet more weather”

work in progress

Although I understand that the UK weather was dreadful over the holidays, I’m not sure that it was really cold; certainly there are already signs of spring about. Of course we’re bound to get some real winter weather later, so I hope Nature has the good sense to be patient.

spray of buds

Chrysalis

Tight as apple pips,

buds spiral around
a moss-supple stalk

anticipating spring
when they will split 

and shake free

tissue wings.

 
That’s a draft, and questions remain:
Continue reading “work in progress”

autumn wings II

For years I have been sure that there’s a poem in the woodshed. Today, I seem to have found another fragment:

butterfly wing
Continue reading “autumn wings II”

autumn wings

Speeding bus
startles
a flock of leaves
into flight

autumn leaves