A call

So she calls
In distress
Canned and bottled
Stopper pressed tight
Light throttled and lost

She says she's lost
The wide well travelled road
Of youth and now the path
Is less trod, mossy
Fracturing like arteries
Like split ends
The trees crowd and whisper
Shoes slip in dust

And she says meet here
On this wild forest track
That leads to barren rocks
That leads to scree fields
Meet me
There is no way back.

A funeral

Soot black crow on ashen skies
Ashen as the skin, ashen
Ashen as her weeping eye
Silk strung lash drip
To blossom, cast
Gone but not forgotten.

There is no forgetting
Day of dust and ashes
The full fret of brevity
All the sorrows of mortality
Above all sorrows of life
And yet
There is no forgetting.

Swept hair, glacial smooth
Pinned grief
Under the black winged hood
The black mood
The soot crow's screech

There is no forgetting that we can know
A salve.

Corgette seeds

I strip pith from the fruit of trifids
Fan leafed behemoth so prolific
One hollowed marrow
Engorged gourd
A corg
No ette.
I have eat its little sisters
For months
Dish after fleshy dish
Persistently grows
The very sight of courgettes sickens
Yet these seeds I pick to sow.