Charm for a walk
 
 
In a dull sky
the guttering flame
of a white heron,
drawn down
to the bourne.

Then a field
of black dock
fluttering and rising
like a bedsheet
of crows.

The webbed slush
that vanishes
to the touch.
Did you pay for it?
Now will you name the world as a gift.
 
 
JLM Morton has poems in in Poetry Review, Rialto, Magma, Mslexia, The London Magazine, Berlin Lit, Anthropocene, Bad Lilies, The Sunday Telegraph and elsewhere. Highly commended by the Forward Prizes, she is also the winner of the Laurie Lee and Geoffrey Dearmer prizes. Her first collection is Red Handed, out now with Broken Sleep Books (2024).