Flying with Larus minutus
An unwanted journey,
return to a dark town in the hill country,
a room where you were born.
And she’s still there,
same wallpaper, same carpets, that
heaving, scratching dog.
I peer out for a sign.
Lights fly out from the gloom.
The only indication that day has begun,
a half-dreamt glimpse of gusting cloud.
We are ready for this:
an 8lb turkey on the parcel shelf,
groceries and sherry in the boot.
Gifts.
High above the motorway, buffeted but resolute,
Larus minutus surfs the plunging sky
unaware of urgency, the glare of tail-lights,
its focus the last spiralling beetles.
The sunroof clicks and hums.
There comes a time.
I whisper my goodbyes but you are occupied,
twiddling the radio…the traffic news…the weather.
Through dark-dawn winterlight, I rise,
re-emerge at thirty feet,
occupy this oblivious, feathered vessel,
the barrel-chested cockpit.
My thin fingers reach into wind-riffled wings,
brace against the turbulence beneath.
The controls are simple:
rise, swoop, swerve, descend.
A tuner offers squawk and scold through
to extended screech.
On a red screen, summer’s last remaining insects
bobble and fizz.
There is no going back.
We are heading east towards the Thames in search
of twisting elver, ragworm, fry of bass and shiner.
We shall venture further, to the haunt of kittiwakes,
disorientating mists.
There is no going back.
The wind is westerly, and strong.
Watch me fly the wind, shape of an angel.
Jane Lovell is the Poetry Society Stanza Rep for Warwickshire. She has had work published in a number of anthologies and journals including Agenda, Poetry Wales, Envoi, the North, Dark Mountain, Zoomorphic, Mslexia and New Welsh Review. She won the Flambard Prize in 2015 and, this year, was shortlisted for the Basil Bunting Prize and named as runner up for the 2016 Wisehouse and Silver Wyvern awards.
The Christmas Loaf
is a year in the making
is stuffed with good things
raisins and ginger
cinnamon and nutmeg
almonds and clove.
is long in the kneading
pummelled and rolled
folded and pummelled again
until yeast is blended
and can begin its work.
is cosseted in its proving
kept by the radiator
tucked into its bowl
with a snowy tea towel,
given time to grow.
is aromatic in its baking
turning golden in the oven.
Is brought to the table,
broken between us
shared and is gone.
Angela Topping‘s eighth collection, The Five Petals of Elderflower is just out from Red Squirrel Press. Her work has been published and anthologised widely. Further information can be found here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angela_Topping