Two Poems for Spring

that other March

my star magnolia in bud

presides in fisted beauty by the wall

bulbs in my garden spiking through the mud

as black birds call.

reminders of that other March

my young son packed to leave

burdened with desert camouflage

the garden bursting into leaf

my star magnolia in bud

bulbs in my garden spiking through the mud.

Spring

The street is sudden pink blossom;

the pavement a hopscotch of sun

that glitters and skitters down

railings and dances on bumper and pram

in a street of sudden pink blossom

the trumpet of car horn and drum

of the feet of early commuters

has a beat less wearisome

down a street of sudden pink blossom

(surely yesterday’s branches were bare?)

Spring arrived overnight with a blush on

and flowers in her hair.

Chrys Salt

Fasting

FASTING

by Iyad Hayatleh

From dawn to dusk

I go without food and water

and have no sense of hunger

for hunger is not the hunger of stomachs;

it is the longing

longing of lovers to be with their beloved;

it’s the yearning

yearning of the homeless to return to the land

where memories for six decades

fall asleep on a promise,

the promised return of the dream

on the wings of the nightingale.

Years rush behind years

like clouds hiding days of deep grief

of exile

in waving layers

to leave only the evening of life

and tears of the stranger

with few remaining wishes.

O powerful night

please lift the veil of the sky

and bring glad tidings to the flood of worshippers,

to my family and my people,

tidings of the bright morning coming soon

with blessing for the whole world.

My love

my God, the Lord of heaven and earth

knower of things unseen

the affectionate, the merciful, the gracious, the greatest,

for you I fast my long day

to you I pray my solemn night.

May I win some approval from you

and may you remove from my shoulders the burden of sin.

Cleanse my soul for thirty days with the beauty of forbearance

and let me reach the day of Eid

a new person, with a new dress.

Translated by Tessa Ransford with the poet, Iyad Hayatleh

Poems for the Equinox

2 quintas

1)

at sundown

first the snow capped mountains

then the sky and sea

turn smoky pink -

people linger on the Esplanade

2)

The woman walks with crutches -

her donkey, close behind her

carries olive branches in his pannier

carries her pace, her rhythm -

the first drops of rain begin to fall

Light Flurry of Snow

Grey sky – of an even dullness

so it looks flat

as a well-painted tin plate.

Like winter again I say to the bus driver -

oh – the last flurry before spring he says

as if he was announcing the name

of a stop on the way -

even a destination -

a ticket for Last Flurry please -

if that's as far as you are going

though I'd really rather alight at Spring.

He has light blue, sky-keeper eyes.

Snow turns to sleet

as we ride on the tail-end

of Last Flurry.

Morelle Smith

snowdrops

in freda's garden, finally, spring is on the way....

Where Do Rivers Begin?

Where Do Rivers Begin?

Where do rivers begin?
I’ve never been remotely interested in
wide-mouthed estuaries where fresh meets salt,
where rivers must halt,
knowing that soon enough, on some fated day,
I’ll be sailing that way, skailing
into the ocean of eternity.

For now, I want to foot it back
along the dreary rooted banks,
those tangled briary paths near towns,
bollarded road ends, industrial estates
blocked by burned out cars,
coal - stained strands and sewage pipes,
short-lived silver sands of pleasure beach,
plumbing the mud flats like an arthritic heron
until I see the river bridged and narrowed.

Then further back and in
below stone arches spanned by Telfer and Wade
to the black and foaming tumbling
where the tourists hang over to gawp
at the ranting and rumbling falls,
then further back yet . . .
a swift bend up a glen, up a burn,
be it in Leadhills or Himalayas,
where a startled sheep bolts in alarm
past the ruins of a farm heaped in a broken ruckle . . .

. . . finally to be able
to straddle its clear cable and trickle.
Then up, steeper still
to where cloud smoors hill
on a summit of bubbling capillaries.
It’s there in the boggy mess and black loam
that Nature condenses her tear on a stone
for a birth and a death.

I might stop the ocean here.

Argument

Argument

“Do not become too fond
of life, a favourite green
and long-stemmed glass for wine,
and finely etched, a friend.
Find in Refusal an end –
for all shall equally
be taken.”

Or find peace in attachment so
intense: to wine, to lover, friend, locale,
Life sparks in common miracle.
Swear by red-ochre, soot-black, yellow
work-words, dye-words, bee-words,
clay-words, fish fin dicing, slicing sea-
words, bird-wing winding, binding sky-
words, tree-root gripping, tripping Earth
so hard, that when, just once, they fly,
their happiness is magical; a birth
and buzz. They hum. They sing. They die.


Walter Perrie

from his new book: Lyrics & Tales in Twa Tongues
published by Fras

long poem magazine launch announcement

Launch of the Long Poem Magazine, issue 5: The event will take place at the CCA, Sauchiehall Street, Glasgow at 7pm on Tuesday 22nd March. Hosted by the Scottish Writers' Centre, the reading is in honour of Edwin Morgan, the man and his work. It will feature: the Scottish actor Tam Dean Burn performing about 25 minutes of EM's poem version of Gilgamesh. Adnan al-Sayegh, an international award-winning Iraqi exile will read 'Pages from the Biography of an Exile' in Arabic, with his translator Stephen Watts reading the English language versions. James McGonigal, Sandy and Stephen will read their long poems.