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from<\/em> Wintering<\/strong><\/p>\n 1<\/p>\n Things are hunkering down. Roots <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n David Calcutt<\/strong> is a playwright, poet and fiction writer from the West Midlands. His most recent publication is the poetry collection, The last of the light is not the last of the light<\/em> from Fair Acre Press. He is currently working on two theatre projects with Midland Actors Theatre. Website: http:\/\/davidcalcutt.com\/about\/<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" from Wintering 1 Things are hunkering down. Roots burrow deep, nosing among the winter nests, the curled fur and trembling antennae. The seed lie snug in the earth\u2019s closed fist. Complete darkness. And a heat that\u2019s miserly, generating just enough to keep the heart ticking, to keep the blood chugging through thickening […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[138,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18458","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-2019-poetry-picks","category-prose-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18458","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18458"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18458\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18459,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18458\/revisions\/18459"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18458"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18458"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18458"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nburrow deep, nosing among the winter
\nnests, the curled fur and trembling
\nantennae. The seed lie snug in the
\nearth\u2019s closed fist. Complete darkness.
\nAnd a heat that\u2019s miserly, generating
\njust enough to keep the heart ticking,
\nto keep the blood chugging through
\nthickening veins, sluggish as sap
\nshrinking back to the centre, where
\na sullen fire has buried its embers,
\na treasure stored against the hard times.
\nSuch as now, when day is drawing
\nto its end, when evening descends
\nlike a grey bird roosting, and the
\ncreaturely minds have all shut down.
\nNothing\u2019s getting through, no word
\nof comfort. Except perhaps for the fall
\nof that last leaf, its dying touch an old
\nheartbreak, thunder on a distant planet,
\nthe slow, funereal booming of the wind.<\/p>\n