Fire door

DangerThunder and lightning CautionA box that opens(but should not) CautionRed seeds you could eat(but should not) CautionA bargain to make(but should not) That doorKeep shut Only those who dareDo not. — Earlier this week I took a photo of a door that entertained me: I liked how the list of commands added up to make

As if nurtured

“From the fallen log,
A sapling grew.”

Residue / Our Pride

I was toldthere were regrets,sadness over the thingsgone sour. Still to this dayit’s never been confirmedto my faceby you, the one concerned. I am determinedto maintainit will always bea little too late. As it is, your stupid goodbye gift –I’ve thrown it well away. — It might be pre-birthday angst, hormones or summer-fuelled heat, but

Visitation

All in whitedescended on my doorstep,in a cloud of cologne:the amoretto, the deuce,the quicksilver sonof Mercury. Some spellsare an intercession. — Other poems about visits, hellos and good-byes: Different rides My heart was a rogue balloon Pavement Writer On a traffic island halfway across High Road, evening The mattress turned over In this place, I

On the secret beach

When we’re not thereOr if we arethe wavesdraw up resolve To putter out on shore. Great energy, momentumDissolves in frothy white.The rest draws backto charge on blue To roll a course infinite. — After two years of serious COVID-anxiety, I flew to Mauritius. In the two weeks there I planned to write, read and exercise.

New Years, New Times

Necessary Work Types of Necessary Work: Getting up. Going to work. Eating breakfast; taking meds. Watching for my eye to mend. Watching as the candle burns. Letting go to say goodbye. Waiting. Letting a breeze into the room. More Types of Necessary Work: Devising shapes with pens and Filling lines. New fonts embossed on diary

And

a poem to be paired with With And, another word – verboten in excess, the Creative Writing Rules would warn. And then another thing And, and, And, and. Dandy and, Like but, not to be ushered in at sentence starts. And so for years, and carefully was placed or erased. But now the rules are

Now

In a week, everything has changed. Now the sun is out, the sky is blue. The seasons have made a turn. — Today I am reminded of a much loved poem look – really look that was inspired by an evocative interview with an elderly gentleman about his balcony garden in the Barbican (London). The return

It is May, and livelihood is not a golden beast

I do wonder how one of my ancestors, who lived a life centred around tending her cattle, may see my screen-filled days. It would probably baffle her as to how what I do is work.* It was from such a wondering that I imagined the scene in Listen to me, you golden beauty. This poem

They’re purple but blue better rhymes

They’re purplebut blue better rhymes The hyacinths nosing uswith their blooming scent.Us – the other houseplants,the fridge, the drying linenon the clotheshorse,the competing scented candles.The bold blue hyacinthsexude regardlessand bloom out of their pot. 01/04/2018 — The fridge is humming this morning as I sit at my table and prepare this post. I woke before