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Thursday, May 13, 2021

Two Haiku for May

 


What does the sea know?
Journeys do not end,
Life is the present river.



The apple blossoms of May
Make such tender poems,
Preludes to autumn.



Tuesday, May 11, 2021

The Forgotten Farm

Another ekphrastic poem based on a Greg Hasting's drawing, and memory. More of  Greg's work featuring poetry from Michael Farry, Marian Kilcoyne, Maureen Gallagher and Luke Power can be seen on his Instagram page @greghastings1066, here.


The Forgotten Farm

 

Birds chatter, a thrush jumps

up to peck raspberries,

later alighting on the flowerbed,

quickly poops yellow shit,

eyes me slyly like an alligator,

then flits away.

 

Some children play in grey distance,

calling, shouting, as we did.

A tractor pauses in throttle,

chugs on into the evening.

Roses are eruptions, impressive

by the white-washed shed.

 

The milking parlour’s gable window

is black as the universe.

I see my father through it, thirty years ago.

The Friesians are lined up

with pumps on their udders.

I pat their black and white hide.

 

They swish tails, swat flies away, chew the cud.

Milk churns in the tank, cooling.

A bee settles on a barren rose.

The children are outside again.

As the sun sets, dreadful loneliness,

like a strangling weed, grips my throat

 

before a million silver stars appear.

 

Orla Fay