This thing that happens
before runner beans;
a disobedient scarlet
searches for a way out
choked in black flies
and the tragedy of bees
and everything focused
on metamorphosis
like this orchid tenderness
was the caterpillar part–
a small beauty, lost
in a larger reckoning
and they are still,
not flowers
when they fade
the way that roses do
Month: September 2019
Bodmin Moor
The stag and the worm
and the tenderness of decay
the audacity of wasps
and the perseverance of grass
the hunger of wild things
and the defiance of dirt
the granite bones
and the anarchy of nightfall
the silence of birds
and the rhythm of rain
and the infinite solitude of poetry