Roger elkin

there:
a rising nearness, a beacon
its blueness a raggy topknot mix
of indigo, azure and violet
...

</>Alderley Woods, November the First

i.m. Howard Sergeant
...

Because she aspired to higher things
than other’s uprights, my mother, while Dad’s wealth
held, clung to a Bechstein babygrand –
a black-lacquered toad with sinister grin that squatted
...

Most of the time he’s alone, up at the clouds’
edge, fingering the rigging of the hills as he threads
together the fields’ reticulated setts.
...

are October imposters posing as stones;
masqueraders parading their polished exteriors;
nests of pebbles lying below boles of oaks
...

Astral Projections

I Our fuel bills are costing us
the earth.
...

Nurtured for years on tales of angels,
of gods, of things bringing outward signs
we have gazed on moons, on stars, on suns
and turned our eyes and minds
...

I A Wedding Portrait

i.m. Charles Causley
...

After the temptation
after Adam had done as Eve insisted
and the kiss she had burnt deep into his neck
had grown into apple – Adam’s apple
...

Away From Home

One thousand miles we drove to find a sky like this:
bluer than our tent, big by day, and without cloud to all horizons:
...

</>Acts of Worship: Keeping Warm

i.m. Aggie Smith
...

</>Art Lesson: Perspectives

Close up your eyes, clear out your mind,
think of nothing but blank space…
...

Bump, and in he comes, my son, my six-year-old lump
of boydom, trundling through the door, his arms
a heaving sheaf of blue, so full the colour hides his eyes.
“Bluebells, Mum, ” and the pulled stems bundle in my hands.
...

Six weeks old were the six stirks
when they came to where the sky drags
its blueness from dregs of speedwell and harebell,
and its sunsets from the falcon’s hunger.
...

This week it’s digging ditches, and I’ve been assigned to Jack.
He doesn’t banter much – has got his fags so rarely mithers
Me but stands there, grins and smokes, or takes a casual hack
At last year’s rioting weed, while I nick the ground, cutting back
...

Arkwright might well be surprised to learn his
Cradle of Industrial Revolution that
Rocked him to fame (while children tumbled,
Over-tired, to early graves, and exhausted
...

For Bruno, for Ron

Zed was Zinaida, half-blood-bonded, put in charge
of schooling while the iron-master managed
...

Follow your eye through an autumn morning.
Notice mists lingering round fingers of fir, silver wisps
Caught on auburn leaves. Think this garden is September-sad,
Suddenly old with threads of web, the hedge beginning to thin
...

I
Lulled by stream’s crystal divinity
of seepage beneath the moor’s rim,
I drank myself blind on water
and the sounds of water, the chirrings
...

Beech leaves rehearse whispers of shingle.
Spaced farms apart, cockerels are playing Queenie-I-Koko.
A far dog rasps sawing planks.
...