plant this great choice in height and spread

Plant asters by autumn When all else fades, semi-trailing heath comes into its own. In banks and borders snow-petalled asters make a brilliant ground cover. Shimmering their heads: a butterfly magnet in the wildlife garden’s banks and borders. Plant this by autumn, plant this great choice in height and spread before the winter turns. –

They had slept through storms before

January brought with it a blizzard. Icy darts aimed for our knees and the testing froze our sense of belonging to that land. The old bears sunk deeper in their caves, groaned and turned their backs on winter’s sluice trusting that in time from it would flow all the blooms of spring. 31/12/14 — I

Transition/ Disclosed

From night’s horizon sweep in yowls and howls across the polar plain. Glacial blue dims. The sharpest window opens above: stars minted by the chill. — Today’s prompt for A Poem A Day October was, “Write a poem incorporating the concept of being ‘frozen,’ whether literal or not.” All day I have been mulling over

Interior Holdings

A turn to the inside, draws out liquorice laces, long and sweet to suck and chew; This turn to the inside locates in other corners of the paper-layered drawer small tacks of past stings — Scheduling a poem every day for a month (from 18 Jan. to 19 Feb.) made me feel impressively productive. Now

Pairings

The soda needs fountain; the lolli needs pop. Pink milk goes for shake; red counters seek top. On jukeboxes rave and motors rev bike. Heat moves towards wave, while cream swirls for ice. Young leather struts jackets, then shy ankles flash socks. The point brings us to make-out where our lips search for lock. —

Autumn’s ripened harvest store

Black coats, black pavements, black umbrellas, the rain Nights black by 20:00. Achoos in the office. Splutters on the train. Time to switch on the heating and buy doughnuts in the morning. There has sprung the winter hunger and it will only grow — On the 19th September 1819, John Keats wrote this lilting ode