Tag / nature

by Carol J Forrester

Honeysuckle Wife #DVersePoetics

Cut me off at the ankles or so you said,

stood astride my stump, saw grinned.

‘Not so pretty now are we’

either of us.

 

Spent the winter finding my roots,

you brought on your hot house girls

throwing out the deadheads

before they even had chance to wilt.

 

Spring freshened up all that toughening

from too many years the same.

Found new shoots moving upwards,

more bend, less bark to my bite.

 

Summer and I redecorated it all,

cloaked myself in colour,

announced my presence, my survival.

Dared you to try cutting me down again.

 

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by Carol J Forrester

Out In The Garden – #DVersePoets #MondayHaibun

The peas have podded. I’m not sure if it’s the snap, or your bog standard, good old trusty garden type, but they’ve podded first with the white petals of the flowers still stuck to the green of their shells.

Inside the crop is still too small, too young. I checked today. Popped my nail into the seam, slit through the flesh, cracked it open. New growth, old book. They both sound the same.

They are not ready for harvest, but when you bite down they explode. They taste like spring, or summer, or something else that’s hot days and sudden rain storms. They tasted like they should do. New and fresh.

It’s been a wet one,

this spring, this downpour of water

thickening the green.

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by Carol J Forrester

A Garden Variety Hurt

I looked up what ivy was supposed to represent,

after we called the man with the poison

to clear the wooden fence panel right to the root.

This creeping plant,

that works its way between the cracks,

and closes its fist so slowly,

so quietly,

that you cannot see the brickwork break,

it’s supposed to represent friendship.

I thought about you then,

how I’d failed to see how deep you’d planted yourself

until the moment that you cracked me clean in half.

Like ivy, you keep coming back

no matter the cold or the drought,

there is no prying those tendrils loose,

no poison that will make this shadow of you wither.

I must live with the damage you have caused.

I must somehow learn how not to crumble.

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by Carol J Forrester

Valley Bound

I could sleep here,

belly warm against the stone

arms splayed,

wings,

bent at the elbows,

reaching

perhaps to hold

but for now still,

warm,

cheek pressed to rock

sun baked,

lazy,

stubbornly forgotten

long ago

when this place was ice

long from melting.

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View From The Top Of Snowdon – By Carol J Forrester

Since there is no Quadrille night this Monday over at DVersePoets I thought I’d write one inspired by my recent trip to Snowdonia National Park. The views were utterly stunning and it really does feel like you’re escaping the modern world.

A Quadrille is a poem written in exactly 44 words. The DVerse Poets Pub runs a fortnightly Quadrille prompt for those who fancy having a go in the company of some wonderful fellow blogger/poets. 

by Carol J Forrester

Rust

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I have never liked the way rust feels against the skin.

Shards of old paint curling and collapsing

beneath the press of tiny, grubby fingers

as the latch on the gate fights to remain shut,

last weeks rain, too much for something so old

to face without a little protest.

The tiny flakes that stay behind,

stuck into the sweat and the mud,

too small and sharp to brush off all together

no matter how many times hands are scrubbed

against dirt stained jeans with patches at the knees

or run across the grain of old fence posts

that dot the garden paths and always lead

back home.

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