Doreen Case
Foxglove - Digitalis Purpurea
In centuries past
an ancient instrument
gave music from an arch of bells.
They called it ‘gleow’
Anglo-Saxon ‘music’.
Foxes music became
foxglove.
The white witch
by her skills made it Aaron’s Rod.
Bullock’s Lungwort
soothed away the warts
from man and animal,
steadied the heart beat
lined winter shoes
with its plump woolly leaves.
Her black sister
made it Hag’s Taper, Candlewick,
and by her mischief
lit many a fire
and brought about
her own destruction..
In woodland and garden
stand the purple spires.
Bees struggle up
the dappled tunnels,
load sown
the tempting tongues,
then back away,
sacs heavy with gold,
and from its honey
we receive hearts-ease,
nothing of the poison,
the bloom’s sweet paradox.
Page(s) 24
magazine list
- Features
- zines
- 10th Muse
- 14
- Acumen
- Agenda
- Ambit
- Angel Exhaust
- ARTEMISpoetry
- Atlas
- Blithe Spirit
- Borderlines
- Brando's hat
- Brittle Star
- Candelabrum
- Cannon's Mouth, The
- Chroma
- Coffee House, The
- Dream Catcher
- Equinox
- Erbacce
- Fabric
- Fire
- Floating Bear, The
- French Literary Review, The
- Frogmore Papers, The
- Global Tapestry
- Grosseteste Review
- Homeless Diamonds
- Interpreter's House, The
- Iota
- Journal, The
- Lamport Court
- London Magazine, The
- Magma
- Matchbox
- Matter
- Modern Poetry in Translation
- Monkey Kettle
- Moodswing
- Neon Highway
- New Welsh Review
- North, The
- Oasis
- Obsessed with pipework
- Orbis
- Oxford Poetry
- Painted, spoken
- Paper, The
- Pen Pusher Magazine
- Poetry Cornwall
- Poetry London
- Poetry London (1951)
- Poetry Nation
- Poetry Review, The
- Poetry Salzburg Review
- Poetry Scotland
- Poetry Wales
- Private Tutor
- Purple Patch
- Quarto
- Rain Dog
- Reach Poetry
- Review, The
- Rialto, The
- Second Aeon
- Seventh Quarry, The
- Shearsman
- Smiths Knoll
- Smoke
- South
- Staple
- Strange Faeces
- Tabla Book of New Verse, The
- Thumbscrew
- Tolling Elves
- Ugly Tree, The
- Weyfarers
- Wolf, The
- Yellow Crane, The