Poetry - Lynn White

  Crossing Over Running downhill, on and on, the orange sun bearing down on me. Scorching me,   burning me up until I come to a river cold with ice. Icy water flowing too fast. Too fast. Faster than I can run. Flaming under that bridge. A bridge to somewhere   from here, from where I am. But where is here   or there? And is the bridge real or a bridge of dreams. Or, a bridge for my dreams, leading nowhere. If I cross over will I plummet into the nowhere on the other side. Shall I try? Or shall I stay here running looking for the light until I find it. https://uglywriters.com/2022/12/31/crossing-over/?fbclid=IwAR16QlkTmOeA5INGBRR1hKIThoM05BhZFNHbE4J3kxDhFGy6tsS7GkcH14s

  Squeeze Don’t squeeze too firmly you never know what will emerge from inside solid walls and even caring hands can be destructive. But sometimes something beautiful can emerge from that which is destroyed. So sometimes it’s good to take a chance give a squeeze and wait and see the new growth burst into being. https://visualverse.org/submissions/squeeze/

  Unicorn I shouldn’t have done it. I’ve always shunned   the spotlight, always feared it. Unlike the horses and dogs   who play the game,   perform, do what’s expected by their human providers,   by their audience. I’ve always been afraid   of being seen onstage just in case I was taken short and golden notes fell from my arse and made   rainbows brighter   than the spotlight, upsetting the lighting engineers. I think we’re all the same, we unicorns, shy creatures. That’s why we’ve   survived, hiding in dreams. http://www.theworldofmyth.com/?fbclid=IwAR2fSEMAQKsMFmIWLVY3axgC_wFmZrka3bWeTfw9seg4aV1TEkqy2VJutN0

  Icon To discover an icon painting course   in a mountain town in Wales was unexpected, but as a lover of the unexpected   I enrolled. Tad, the Orthodox priest looked authentic with his black robes and long beard. That was unexpected too. There was no gold there only slate which was not suitable so we made do with paint and shiny foil. Tad was pleased with the results and congratulated us all. We gave them to his church as expected. https://www.ekphrastic.net/the-ekphrastic-challenges

  Beloved She said, I was her heart’s desire, her beloved. Sometimes I think she meant it. I think sometimes I felt it too. But now I feel   empty of desire I feel only strangeness holding her heart in my hand. I feel it pulsating with life. I feel the blood flowing like tears, while she lies still, so still, empty emptied   of desire heartless, like me. http://www.sirenscallpublications.com/pdfs/SirensCallEZine_Winter2022.pdf

  Shrouded They’re shrouded in mist almost as dark as the shrouds they wear to cover themselves, to cloak themselves   for their journey. Shrouds like dusty abayas uniformly grey, shapeless, bloodless, formless, lifeless grey. Only their mouths still red, stained by their final feast. The feast of what was left. And now there’s nothing, nothing any more. No more. Nothing. http://www.sirenscallpublications.com/pdfs/SirensCallEZine_Winter2022.pdf

  Feed The Flames Gather round the hearth it’s a cosy place if the fire is burning and we’ll keep it burning never fear the flames flickering dancing alight alive, a living fire. Gather round, we’ll keep it burning the home fire watch   closely   let yourself be hypnotised bewitched be mesmerised by the flickering flames, waving and dancing. Listen to them   as they crackle and scream as a living fire must. Gather round, never fear only feed the flames. http://www.sirenscallpublications.com/pdfs/SirensCallEZine_Winter2022.pdf

  Sore Fingers At night my long hair was wrapped in rags - pristine strips of thick white cloth. Sore fingers, my mother called them. My unruly curls bandaged into six stiff sore fingers, to be unravelled in the morning to reveal shiny ringlets ready to be tied in bunches with broad, bright, bias cut ribbons. I wanted plaits. All the heroines in my childhood   books had plaits I dreamt about plaits fantasised about plaits. No more sore fingers. I wanted plaits. Sometimes I untied the ringlets, to my mothers displeasure, and made untidy, unsuccessful plaits. Plaits would ruin my hair, my mother said. Would spoil it’s natural curl, destroy it in some way never specified. I didn’t care. I hated ringlets. I hated sore fingers. I wanted plaits. https://www.pikerpress.com/article.php?aID=9469

  Mellow Yellow I’ve never been mad about saffron, or turmeric, come to that and the colour yellow doesn’t suit me, makes me look strangely   washed out, or so I think. I like the colour though, love daffodils and buttercups, even dandelions, so I could celebrate them by wearing it concealed. But no one would know if they couldn’t see so I don’t do that. Instead it graces my kitchen walls. There it’s timeless, part of the kitchen in every place I’ve lived from back then to eternity. https://store.pothi.com/book/jay-chakravarti-ed-self-portrait/

  The Essence Of Me You have to dig deep to find me in there - the shape of my face, the source of my breath among the squiggles and swirls making a frame for my hiding place. I am more than the breeze of those movements the touch of those fripperies, those feathers and fans and what lies beneath is more fluid, more difficult to grasp   than my exhalations. I am more than black and blue, more than breath and bone, so much more and my essence lies in there somewhere waiting to be discovered. https://store.pothi.com/book/jay-chakravarti-ed-self-portrait/

  Talking Turkey There is a rumour going around as rumours do in this community. It is said that a celebration is being planned by humans. Specifically by those humans who feed and pet us. It is being said that we will be invited to join them, that we will be a part, an important part of the celebration. So now we are waiting wondering  what role we shall play, wondering  if we will get drunk, wondering  if we will enjoy it all as much as our humans will enjoy  our presence. https://medusaskitchen.blogspot.com/2022/12/carols-from-christmas-crow.html

  Christmas Crow We watched the crow with fascination as it tap tapped on the window pane, saw its black eyes gleaming, its wet feathers shining in the moonlight. And we understood. We understood that it wanted to join us, to perch amongst the baubles on our shining tree to share our fireside warmth on Christmas Eve and escape  the cold winter rain. We heard it promise to sing for us We opened the window and let it in. https://medusaskitchen.blogspot.com/2022/12/carols-from-christmas-crow.html It crowed a Christmas carol.

  Christmas Tree Trimming the tree was a Christmas Eve ritual in my family. Each year my cousin would come to help my mum. They would carefully take the glass baubles from the box that used to hold her big doll called Topsy. Then they would put them all in their special place in my family. “No the elephant doesn’t go there, that’s where the peacock should be and the Christmas pudding goes above.” Everything had it’s place on the Christmas tree in my family. There were shiny miniature crackers never to be pulled and curly, coloured candles never to be lit, for economy. No tinsel was allowed for that was cheating. Only baubles to cover the tree, hiding the green. The glass baubles had belonged to my cousin, so had the tree. And earlier, to her mother and granny, all in my family. The only family to fall out over trimming a tree, my cousin’s husband used to say with some truth, as every year the arguments as to which bauble should go where were replayed in my family. So much stress over t

  Father Christmas I was so excited. It was nearly Christmas and I was going to meet Father Christmas himself. I was so excited,  wearing my best coat and bonnet, hopping from one foot to the other in the long queue of children waiting with their mums to be allowed into Santa’s Grotto. I was so excited. We were nearly there. I could see the grotto with it’s tinsel and fairy lights twinkling. I was going to sit on his knee  and have my picture taken, and that was in an age when photographs were even rarer than Christmases.. I was so excited. There were the elves... But wait.. they were cardboard. Where were the real elves, the magic ones, why weren’t they there? “They’re much too busy”, my mum said. “But Father Christmas will be real”. We paid our money and there he was. He really was. I couldn’t wait to climb on his knee and examine his beard. I’d never seen a beard before. But he was very tetchy when I pulled at it and told me to stop. Then it went lop sided and I realised  it was a f