Sloes
Saltwater fingers deep inland here.
Habitat of oystercatchers,
curlews, sentinel herons along the banks.
Blackthorn and stunted oaks.
Sparser, more bitter than blackberries,
ripening a whole month later,
these spell the dip to the solstice,
and are barbed like sea urchins.
They’ll be ferried home, infused
in a bottle at the back of the cupboard
for two, maybe three years
till very nearly forgotten
then brought out to firelight,
the annual challenge at Scrabble.
Poured into antique glasses –
those long-stemmed cordial flutes –
the candle-flame making the liquor
a sacrament, potent as blood.
It’s as though we’re drinking
our yesterdays, toasting passed time.
A ruby glow suffuses the sky now,
lights the trees, reeds, glistening tidal mud.
The last of the day. We leave with that
acute sense of the year turning. Wassail.
Page(s) 25
magazine list
- Features
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- 10th Muse
- 14
- Acumen
- Agenda
- Ambit
- Angel Exhaust
- ARTEMISpoetry
- Atlas
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- Brando's hat
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- 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