the fruits of the earth

figs ripening on the tree

While each grape dreams a dream
of champagne-bubble destiny, figs
turn to honey on the branch. Pumpkins swell,
and melons hoard up sunshine, sprawled
voluptuous on their beds of straw.

 
 
There was just enough blue sky to take the photo this morning – yes, figs do sometimes grow vertically upwards, and although they look less appetising, the honey-brown ones that are beginning to wrinkle are the sweetest. The clouds are gathering again, though, so the poor melons and pumpkins are more likely to be ‘bathing voluptuous’ in fields all around the Valle del Tiétar within an hour or so.

early autumn

It’s September, and, with its usual regularity, the weather has changed and it begins to feel quite autumnal. We’ve had a few storms recently, which have brought down yet more windfalls.

 windfalls in the orchard
Continue reading “early autumn”

fairground colours

dodgem cars

Fairground colours fade with sunlight;
chrome still glints, but tawdry pastels
replace pounding neon, and disproportioned
Disney silhouettes pale under ragged awnings.

(Notes for a poem, rather than a finished piece.)
Continue reading “fairground colours”

stars and doves

I don’t have many more shooting stars poems to post on the blog, but there are other things being celebrated this weekend, as well as the perseids.

It’s been several years since I’ve spent August in Spain, as I’ve attended the Swanwick Writers’ Summer School, both as participant and as course leader, since I first won a place some years ago.

Before that, though, I was living in Madrid, and August was important en mi barrio for la fiesta de la Paloma. This year, Monday 15th August will be a fiesta nacional (la Asunción de la Virgen), and in her honour I have dug out this old poem. It was first published in the New Entertainer, I think, when I was writing my Capital Letters column:
Continue reading “stars and doves”

shooting stars

Not perseids this time, just sparkling sunshine reflected off waves that looks** like shooting stars if you screw your eyes up against the glare:

Postcard from the beach

The weather is nice…

The sun is dropping
diamonds on the sea.
I squint against the glare
and see a storm
of shooting stars that fall
too fast to single one
and make a wish.
Yet this whole moment
is a wish for you.

 

** yes, the singular verb agrees with its subject – the sparkling sunshine – but it sure sounds odd.