See America burning

See America burning on a choking smoky white night amid the black light of raging fire

Never Ending Time, by Elena Wenman

Lockdown is ever so painful, make it end / There’s technology, so many apps to try / great what will happen next, this might extend

Sui generis

Of its own kind,
solo straining wings capturing clear breeze,
no higher nor lower a concept than self.

Once were trees

There are roots I’ve always known which wrap around my arms, holding me deep inside the earth, breathing my breath. … More

Exit painting left

After Kaveh Akbar There is this loveable saint: He sees me in fallen down ditches, covered in bracken.

Liquidising Atoms

‘How do you accessorise a bomb? I’d probably go for sprinkles instead of nails’

Bluebird

‘Do not look for my body, my wings, to do but what I make of them.’

Sine qua non

‘We became as reliant as the ocean to the sky, as vital as the heat at the centre of the earth to the thin stem threading together green leaves.’

Flag

‘I wore a flag right down to its first and last threads.’

Affordable Artwork

‘Being an artist means not averting one’s eyes – Akira Kurosawa’

On & On

‘Everything belongs to the rich; from your beating soul to your weeping heart, they bought it all many years hence.’

Your Origami Rose

‘On one of the last days I reached out and closed my hand around your rough, scarred thumb.’

Glued to you

‘I look and sometimes see, sometimes read but mostly my eyes slide across your surface, not fully taking in what you’re saying.’

Love in a time of oceans

‘The woman took a bite out of the love of her life, and spat it out into the ocean.’

There are two

The first of two poems about homelessness. This is merely passing comment, but click through if you’d like to contribute to fending off the crisis in homelessness, by donating to, or volunteering with, Crisis, the national charity for homeless people.