"damson" poems
Picture this: salmon coloured coral with tangerine
Bordering an atoll, and fencing it in.
Emerald clear waters blotched with aquamarine
Crystal clear like porcelain.
Fish as red as berries stewed with damson
Or as yellow as a canary made from brass
Some resemble amber blushed with crimson
And roses with sap spilt on the grass.
Picture a kingfisher as blue as the sea
Brick red wings as sharp as blades
He perches on an old olive tree
With bark as black as the ace of spades.
Picture a raspberry ripple sky
Peaches and lemons draped in-between
Fields as gold as a baked cherry pie
And a rainbow settling on the green.
Jun 21, 2013
Jun 21, 2013 at 8:27 AM UTC
The Night Left
With the smack of a
Panko breaded sunrise
Poppies in the garden
And passionflowers
Peering
through banjaxed window frames
Brusque Coffee roughing up my arteries
Damson Coloured smoke
Bacon & Bacon & Eggs
A little vignette of perfection
Let this morning dawdle
like the hangover that chased the stars out.
Aug 15, 2015
Aug 15, 2015 at 8:57 AM UTC
***** summer(deeply1st)on edge
season, bonny, svelte and croons
with wide cheek rouge splashed
damson thick eve: muscled up
thick little back splayed fitness
invites sin(2ndnever)body the
white heather, comely fragranced,
dew weeping lilies are hushed
coolly at petals crush, the stem
carries 'pon winsome morn
and
the faintly murdered, caving rush
Jul 25, 2012
Jul 25, 2012 at 12:15 AM UTC
Now! the damson crush of swallow wing
to foal the brays of uwound April,
in chattered sleeks of broom gleam hail
that agitate these pagan grains.
Where bud-nip rusts of Bullfinch creak
the gates of prickled secrecy,
the platted creed of wren-song
yolks the whiting peeks of May.
Where an absinthe canter quills a yarn
of nether-world calligraphy
with missives of anemone to
prose the woke terrain,
so a gattling shack of magpies prat
along the miscreants of bine
that heckle servile atrophy in
lung sweet roots of anchored sage
Apr 13, 2017
Apr 13, 2017 at 12:06 PM UTC
Its perspective skewed,
the lie of this land
is all tilts and angles.
Black-thorned hedges
rise in white clouds
to the hilltop farm.
On this Damson Day
it is a damp-mist morning,
the horizon a grey smudge.
Up forest trail and fell-ward,
on the left, a winter-laid hedge,
to the right, a mossy wall.
A riot of new growth lies
at the feet, by the hand:
wild garlic, wilder strawberry,
fresh ferns, and the tiniest violets
hiding on this old path.
Steep steps climb
to a four-acre orchard
primrosed under the pint-sized
trunks of its wiry trees.
There’s the blossom, white as snow.
*Hard to imagine
five months hence,
fully plummed and picked,
Bullace and Damascene
driven by the cartload
to Kendal market.
250 tons they’d reckoned
once, taken by train
to the Preston canners.
Nearer home the fruit
was gined and beered,
cheesed and chucknied.*
Then into the forest,
a plantation girdled
by a dry stone wall
tall on the moorland edge
where beyond
the grey limestone shards
have broken through what
little grass is left
for absent cattle.
Wild with wind
up here today,
so down to reclaim
the forest’s shelter,
and down through fields
to a farm en fête
all cars and crowds.
This, a damson day of best-judged jam,
with artisan breads, Morris with swords,
fiddling folk, agility dogs, St Kilda sheep,
blue eggs and tents of crafts galore.
In the mist and drizzle
homeward and facing west,
there across the valley lie
outposts of blossoming,
fields embroidered,
and the farms necklaced.
Apr 14, 2014
Apr 14, 2014 at 4:18 PM UTC
you’ve changed.
I noticed it
in that final photo
on the mountain.
Your face
as ever fair
now aglow,
tinted with
ministrations
of earth and air,
wind and water,
the kiss and rub
of your lover’s lips,
the play of his fingers
on your freckled cheek,
but more.
These last days,
as though passing through
a necessary door,
as though changing a life-skin,
you have been transformed.
More beautiful now
than even this season’s light,
falling against your window,
filling this room to the brim
with the treasure of autumn.
I am entranced.
And why,
yesterday,
Dear Keeper of my Heart,
I stood transfixed in your kitchen
all sense and courtesy
flown into the damson tree.
Suddenly. . .
Aug 30, 2012
Aug 30, 2012 at 1:24 AM UTC
America is fuckin'
a bit its lips
are
America is
its tongue
the slippery
and sublime
it
so deeply feels
its throat
tight to fill pretty
her eyes
rolling wonderful
the whites
roundishly
enervated pink
with
a bit of sharp
a bit
of
glass
smoke and
pipes
her lipsfull
the meat
of ****
and
when you
push between their parting
emits
the frailest squeak
but
*** er
the she
wants to
please *** er
the fucc
er lips
the cooly mess
er cheeks
damson stained
and puckering to
kisss
Jul 16, 2013
Jul 16, 2013 at 4:27 PM UTC
And Mr Chaff
was always on
about getting things done,
and to make sure
all our work was done
before we retired
for the night;
and Elsie and I
made sure we did
all our work
before we went to bed,
and leaving Mrs Damson
(the cook)in the kitchen,
we make our way
up to the attic
where our bedroom is,
and it is a small room,
just enough for the double bed,
and chest of drawers,
and a washstand
with a wash bowl and jug,
and a small fireplace
where we were allowed a fire
in winter.
Anyway we get to the room
and shut the door,
and we light our candle,
and draw the shabby curtains
on the day and get undressed.
“Lily,” Elsie says,
“what a day,
glad that's over.”
And it has been
a long day:
up at 5.30am
to light the fires
in the rooms downstairs,
then help Mrs Damson
get breakfast prepared,
and so on, until it was time
to relax in bed and sleep,
but as we get undressed
we have a quick wash
in cold water and dry,
and get into our nightgowns
and climb into bed
and lay down
and snuggle up
to each other,
and she kisses me
and I kiss her,
and that is how we start,
and well we do things
which my mum'd
have her heart stop,
if she knew,
but it is our time
after all
and who knew
except us two
doing what
we liked to do.
Sep 15, 2018
Sep 15, 2018 at 3:09 AM UTC
Here, in country dark
the black so thick
one can almost
touch it
feel it
ooze out of the moment
...before time.
I am 9.
Cork is a somewhere
adrift in space
as I
this midnight child
steal from sleep
& into Granny's garden.
The dark erases
my physical body
until there is only me
thinking me
as if thought were
the only thing
keeping me alive.
I take a leaf
hidden from my sight
known only
by its touch.
smear it against
the house's wall
(Granny inside
snoring in sleep).
Here, an invisible berry
seen only by fingertips
squashed colour
staining the moment
with its magic
my hands all goosegog & damson.
And now
the stolen match
struck against
the world itself
making the crudely
drawn
emerge into being
the flame's flicker
making it come
alive
in my mind.
9 year old me
reaching...reaching
back through
the ages
touching time
as if it were
a tangible thing.
Knowing now
how the caveman felt
as he created
a creature
made from the destruction
of leaf and berry
springing into life
in the shadow's dance
a creature made of fire
and dark.
And then
the match goes out
& I am
9 again
hopping around
with burnt fingertips.
Watching time
as it collapses
become the boy
once more
frightened out of his
20th Century self
journeying through time
in the sudden
scratch of a stolen match.
Jul 26, 2015
Jul 26, 2015 at 4:36 PM UTC
Picture This
Picture this: salmon coloured coral with tangerine
Bordering an atoll, and fencing it in.
Emerald clear waters blotched with aquamarine
Crystal clear like porcelain.
Fish as red as berries stewed with damson
Or as yellow as a canary made from brass
Some resemble amber blushed with crimson
And roses with sap spilt on the grass.
Picture a kingfisher as blue as the sea
Brick red wings as sharp as blades
He perches on an old olive tree
With bark as black as the ace of spades.
Picture a raspberry ripple sky
Peaches and lemons draped in-between
Fields as gold as a baked cherry pie
And a rainbow settling on the green.
Apr 29, 2015
Apr 29, 2015 at 12:04 PM UTC
i have(foot brutally)
in grass newly wet
trod
the lick of
waifish
damp
greeness('tween toes particularly futile blushed)at
beads of damson
slung eve,
falls
A
S
T
A
R into earth SWELLS
crystal
keen
glassy summer night
crisply etched in sleeping trees
FLOWERS!at whose
gentler fullness
the jagged suddenly
cold
of
"goodbyesun"
whispered the errant
predictable mountain
slunk
fat
in
dark
i
Aug 6, 2012
Aug 6, 2012 at 10:43 PM UTC
Just thought I would share this with you again that I wrote for the talking newspapers for the blind. It was published in 2003.
Picture this: salmon coloured coral with tangerine
Bordering an atoll, and fencing it in.
Emerald clear waters blotched with aquamarine
Crystal clear like porcelain.
Fish as red as berries stewed with damson
Or as yellow as a canary made from brass
Some resemble amber blushed with crimson
And roses with sap spilt on the grass.
Picture a kingfisher as blue as the sea
Brick red wings as sharp as blades
He perches on an old olive tree
With bark as black as the ace of spades.
Picture a raspberry ripple sky
Peaches and lemons draped in-between
Fields as gold as a baked cherry pie
And a rainbow settling on the green.
Sep 25, 2014
Sep 25, 2014 at 3:39 AM UTC
Youth clatters itself on tomorrow’s hopes
Winding wistfully hair on cobweb dream
More beautiful the pathway widens heart
And thé fluttering bee falling nectar leave.
Oh pretty one pick up your dancing skirts
And find that arm around a narrow waist
He will sing you in the Summer nightings
And you will find the damson juice sweet.
Love Mary **
Sep 7, 2018
Sep 7, 2018 at 1:56 PM UTC
there will die in me nothing that has been you (though if even instantaneously you pressed against my eyes your face in some passing razor of a hot second flensed the air and flung across all silence your perfect stare back into me and it felt like SUMMER when you did and baby i'll never feel nor never kiss thy damson and crisp mirth lined lips)
buttherewilldieinmenothingthathasbeenyou
Nov 5, 2012
Nov 5, 2012 at 2:31 AM UTC
To tell you the truth
the problems this fairy has
were firmly set in her youth
Many moons ago for this poor
fairy with the sweet tooth.
She thought nothing to dip
a sugar wand in fairy paste
consisting of damson whip
strawberry surprise and
fairy apple crystal pip.
It would coat her teeth in time
with decay and rot quite badly
she used toothpaste caked in lime
but that system failed leaving her
with teeth looking like slime.
But what can she do, let's think
we all know she likes the sweet stuff
but she must now have water to drink
good food that will help her like
little apples that are pink.
Aug 3, 2015
Aug 3, 2015 at 6:30 AM UTC
A sky of painted rain from custard yellow clouds, fell beyond my gallery window glass.
The grass a silken thread of cinnamon fire, vermillion and orange tea brewed strong and hot, which ran to choppy rivers damson plum and vintage flowing wine, stretched far beyond my own imagining
to boiling seas of unknown hue.
Did a morning ever dawn which held such colour and such light, If so it isn’t one I ever knew!
Oct 8, 2020
Oct 8, 2020 at 7:12 AM UTC
he sat on the step in the heat,
I, sickly dozed under
the damson tree.
lizards flicked.
while in the village
below this hill
music played.
a wedding.
sbm
Image
May 4, 2013
May 4, 2013 at 12:34 PM UTC
dudes
i am not worried about how i sound in my youtube videos for AAA YOUTUBE TV and aaron clayton
because people are watching me, it’s like TV stars, some area liked, as ted damson’s becker said
you should feel free to hate or like my stuff, you should just do it with the right reasons
i have over 50 views on a truck parade in gungahlin, and on nye i had voices of women
saying YOU **** be an adult, but i don’t care, because i checked, i was pretty popular
that night, i still hear that voice, but i drown it out, to be good, i don’t care how i look
in my videos, just as long as i am having fun, you see i don’t care on the teasing, because i
can handle the teasing, i just totally ignore it, and i have fun, i gave up my breakfast show
because i am not a morning entertainer, cause the medication gave me no energy
but that doesn’t stop me from enjoying youtube, or hello poetry or art colony
everyone likes me on these sites, i am popular, ok, i am liked all over the internet
i am bringing my characters out, i will bring a few more out, i was marco and topsy the clown
at poetry slam, that is why the young say i am cool, and i will continue to do this
i did room to move today and i brought my patrick dunbar character out, which
is a previous life of mine, anyway, they called me AWESOME, and i am
watch my brumbies night live show, on AAA YOUTUBE TV
i am an internet celebrity, pretty **** cool
Feb 28, 2015
Feb 28, 2015 at 6:41 AM UTC
A lone slipper
Diary I wrote aged 18 (Unread, too piercing)
Battered biscuit tin I’d kept for years (in the hope it would prove useful (it didn’t))
Takeaway plastics (covered in grease and crusted rice)
Receipts (seconds after I am given them)
Poo explosion stained leggings aged 6-9 months at the Horniman Museum on 1st August 2020 (Jack’s 31st birthday)
My phone (an accident, obviously) into the bin at the hospital while I was in labour (retrieved soon after by a kindly HCA)
Green peppers from every meal in which they’ve been served to me (red and yellow are fine)
Opportunities (various, for various reasons)
A half used tube of e45 at least 5 years old (not mine, left by an ex boyfriend)
Eggshells, broken so a witch can’t use them for a sailboat (now I take care to leave them seaworthy)
Probably 20 pairs of cheap headphones (pocket knotted and wires exposed)
My potential (sorry Nan)
A makeup brush my toddler put in the (unflushed) toilet
Unopened bank statements (not even shredded)
Mystery unlabelled freezer meal (too scared to defrost, could be literally anything from anytime )
Tote bag stained with damson juice (used as emergency foraging bag one autumn, furtively collected from a stranger's driveway)
Old, bobbly tights (constricting yet baggy in all the wrong places)
Uni Laptop from 2012 (riddled with viruses from streaming tv shows by the hundred, and thousands of limewire songs)
My childhood dream to become a stain glass windows maker (not so much thrown away as abandoned due to not being a real career)
And the second slipper, found a week later
Aug 16, 2022
Aug 16, 2022 at 5:17 PM UTC
Picture this: salmon coloured coral with tangerine
Bordering an atoll, and fencing it in.
Emerald clear waters blotched with aquamarine
Crystal clear like porcelain.
Fish as red as berries stewed with damson
Or as yellow as a canary made from brass
Some resemble amber blushed with crimson
And roses with sap spilt on the grass.
Picture a kingfisher as blue as the sea
Brick red wings as sharp as blades
He perches on an old olive tree
With bark as black as the ace of spades.
Picture a raspberry ripple sky
Peaches and lemons draped in-between
Fields as gold as a baked cherry pie
And a rainbow settling on the green.
Dec 28, 2016
Dec 28, 2016 at 9:12 AM UTC
There in a garden with flower beds
Laid out with a patch of green between
And old pink roses smelling of cold cream
Spread out in an oval ring
Asparagus fern blows in the wind
Sending its red seeds into the lawn
The birds sing in a damson tree
And I sit upon a rubber tyre swing.
So I recall those warmest days
When there was nothing but play
And the quietness of those times
When my mind was mine
Never went away.
Dear little girl in your simple dress
Lying with the sun
Watching the shadows move about
Their shapes cast on the ground.
Finding only what was good
Under the prickly gooseberry bush
And ants and snails to watch all day
With fondness and respect.
But time and peace end in ways
None of us expect
But the Beauty of those years
None of us regret.
Love Mary ***
Mar 5, 2018
Mar 5, 2018 at 10:40 AM UTC