{"id":233,"date":"2011-04-22T13:00:00","date_gmt":"2011-04-22T13:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ink.verticalplus.co.uk\/archive\/?p=233"},"modified":"2020-12-09T16:23:26","modified_gmt":"2020-12-09T16:23:26","slug":"poems-from-esther-morgan-and-isobel-dixon","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/poems-from-esther-morgan-and-isobel-dixon\/","title":{"rendered":"Poems from Esther Morgan and Isobel Dixon"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Gardener<\/span>

This time of year again \u2013\u2028<\/span>
doing the work we must bend to or kneel,\u2028\u2028<\/span>

like the man rising at evening\u2028<\/span>
from the furrows he\u2019s been digging all day,\u2028\u2028<\/span>

his hands muddy with planting,<\/span>
\u2028patting the earth tenderly into place<\/span>

\u2028\u2028around each nameless seed.<\/span>
\u2028Along the lane, the rain-washed body<\/span>

\u2028\u2028of a hare, blackthorn flowering overnight.\u2028<\/span>
Time to be turning in<\/span> he thinks<\/span>

\u2028\u2028as he gazes at a sowing of early stars\u2028<\/span>
with eyes just the colour you remember.<\/span>


<\/font>*Esther Morgan<\/span>'s third collection Grace<\/a>,
\n published by Bloodaxe, is due out in October 2011. She is an editor and
\n historic recordings manager for The Poetry Archive. She currently lives
\n in rural Norfolk where she's waiting for another new arrival – her
\nfirst baby due in June.<\/font>



\u2018And The Hyacinth\u2019s in Bloom \u2013 A Lovely Blue\u2019<\/span>

My mother\u2019s sudden pride in flowers \u2013 <\/span>
how our desert garden grows<\/span>
now that our father\u2019s gone, <\/span>
now she has the time.<\/span>

The shrouded mystery of bulbs,<\/span>
veined globes of white:<\/span>
the pale bulge of my father\u2019s ankle bone,<\/span>
and the startling, naked nub \u2013 <\/span>
the knot and pit where once his toe had been.<\/span>

Dry April soil fed slowly<\/span>
with these relics, what is left of him:<\/span>
long-tended, worn-out,<\/span>
all their pruned-back cankers quiet now.<\/span>

After the amputation, bruising, weariness,<\/span>
this stony rest, his paradise,<\/span>
my mother\u2019s newfound flowers.<\/span>



<\/font>*<\/span>Isobel Dixon<\/a>
\n grew up in South Africa, and now lives in Cambridge, England. Her
\ncollection A Fold in the Map is published by Salt.  Her next collection,
\n The Tempest Prognosticator<\/span>, comes out from Salt in July 2011. <\/p>\n

<\/font>This poem is from <\/span>A Fold in the Map<\/span><\/font>  <\/font><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The GardenerThis time of year again \u2013\u2028doing the work we must bend to or kneel,\u2028\u2028like the man rising at evening\u2028from the furrows he\u2019s been digging all day,\u2028\u2028his hands muddy with planting,\u2028patting the earth tenderly into place\u2028\u2028around each nameless seed.\u2028Along the lane, the rain-washed body\u2028\u2028of a hare, blackthorn flowering overnight.\u2028Time to be turning in he thinks\u2028\u2028as […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-233","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-prose-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/233","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\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=233"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/233\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23878,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/233\/revisions\/23878"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=233"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=233"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=233"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}