by Helen Ivory | Dec 30, 2020 | Featured, Poetry, Twelve Days of Christmas
Christmas in the wasteland For Prof R Klein Bird foot snow arrows east Sun is oblong yolk spilt over elms I see Hiroshima setting and all is silent now. I see you in snow drift apparitions Bride not to be scattered to five winds I feel the chilblain frost and think of...
by Helen Ivory | Dec 29, 2020 | Featured, Poetry, Twelve Days of Christmas
Parenting Book I wrote it down when they woke me at 3am to tell me they didn’t like ham anymore, only jam and cheese. How on the toilet is the best place to sing. I kept a notebook for years: the sore throat bad as three arrows sticking...
by Helen Ivory | Dec 28, 2020 | Featured, Poetry, Twelve Days of Christmas
Domain The fork garden is planted by hallmark, by taxonomic value from the tines down. Frost plates the handle, silver lip at the edge of soil, dug out in winter, dug out of winter, bringing up root and louse. If dirt bound and iced in the fork...
by Helen Ivory | Dec 27, 2020 | Featured, Poetry, Twelve Days of Christmas
Christmas Ritual, 1. After lunch she whispers to the carved mahogany table legs feels around for the mouse cut into the back of the armchair where her grandmother reads paperback mysteries. She names that mouse Moses. Then she slides away from the...
by Helen Ivory | Dec 26, 2020 | Featured, Poetry, Twelve Days of Christmas
Mad Santa Someone was here, no not me. Someone who wears pink slippers And paints the walls red Who upturns the upholstery. And downs a few swigs at the breakfast table, Tethers around the edge of the circle, asking to be out. Someone with a hood...
by Helen Ivory | Dec 25, 2020 | Featured, Poetry, Twelve Days of Christmas
Interior, with Child Soon enough, we were holed up in snow. So much to be glad for, our baby between us in the bed. We hummed carols, lit the tree. Such an ochre month. We lay with curtains open, sky a wash of Prussian blue, chimneys smoking, ice creaking on branches....
