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I said to the moon, ‘You know nothing’.

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We stand at the shore,
our toes foam with blue ink.
I dive for oysters, my graceless feet
a mermaid’s tail.
I anoint your milky orbs with pearls.

Your eyes are moonstones,
smile, a crescent moon.
You are the lighthouse; I am a moth
attracted to your light.

I stutter constellations;
Cassiopeia trips over my tongue.
A Mirrorball of stars ricochets from
the sunburst of your song.

The sea makes screen prints;
sells them to tourists drinking tears
from champagne flutes.
They cling to glaciers;
carve ice sculptures of love lost.

Our skeletons are xylophones.
We play all the songs —
they are lifelines on our palms.
I do not believe in God,
but we kiss and the universe is ours.

We are stardust,
I write sonnets,
You sing psalms


©2024 Sarah Drury



Poetic Reflections on Time and Nature

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Death of a swift

I am a clock.
How many chimes
until I am

a swift?
A blackbird?
This is a fine song.

I weave blue ribbons
in my hair to catch 
dragonflies. 

Their lace wings
shroud my eyes.
A womb gorged 

with embryos waits
til the next time 
I die.


©2024 Sarah Drury

A Bluebird in 8 Ways

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A BLUEBIRD IN EIGHT WAYS
                           ~ After Wallace Stevens
 
I

A poet is a bluebird
who drizzles the sky
with indanthrene songs 

II

I am making words
out of the bluebird’s tongue,
littered on the paper 
like a rejection letter.

III

The bluebird looks at me
with its reticent eye - 
wants to sprinkle lies
in the blackbird’s ear.

IV

I have no time for cheats.
Bluebirds are full of infidelity,
wagging their sweet 
little tails at the worms.

V

I know a fine song
if it licks my heels.
I smile and my breast heaves
at the fortissimo.

VI

When the bluebird flies away
the chicks’ chasm-jaws 
snatch at a stopped watch.

VII

The snow dusts the blue wings.
Makes snow angels on the ice.
I fall, my womb a pomegranate.

VIII

I never did fit in a box.
Too big dreams for a small forest.
No blackbirds with carbon plumage.
I want diamonds. 

Copyright © Sarah Drury 2022


Wallace Stevens, (1954), 'Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird' from The Collected Poems of Wallace Stevens. New York. Random House.


Images by krstnwatts0 and Johnny Gunn from Pixabay

Sunflowers

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Good morning! An art group I am a member of, on Facebook, has regular themes. This week’s theme is anything related to ‘the sun’, which is in a broad interpretation. There have been some wonderful posts of members’ sunflower paintings, which I find delightful, as I love the happy, optimistic flowers!

I discovered this really interesting article from The National Gallery regarding the most famous sunflower painting ever. You guessed it…Van Gogh’s Sunflowers!

Here is the article: https://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/paintings/learn-about-art/paintings-in-depth/sunflowers-symbols-of-happiness

I painted this sunflower a couple of years ago. It makes me so happy…the beautiful, vibrant, loose colours. I must get a little frame for it and put it somewhere I can gaze at it as therapy when I feel a but challenged!!

Sunflower, Sarah Drury, 2020, watercolour

How do you feel about sunflowers? How about sunflower art? Do the sunny flowers fill you with joy and optimism? I bought a vase of artificial sunflowers to remember a young boy (he was 15) who took his own life by jumping into the River Trent. I keep them on my windowsill where the sun shines onto them. I hope he is at peace.

*Featured header Image by Susanne Jutzeler, Schweiz 🇨🇭 suju-foto from Pixabay

Blackpool Tower

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Many, many years ago I had a very frightening experience. I was young – around 14 – and my life pretty much revolved around playing the cello. I joined an orchestra in Lincoln, which is a fair drive away from my hometown. An older man, must have been sixty-plus, used to give me a lift there. There were usually several of us, but this one night I was alone with him on the journey home. He stopped his car and made a very inappropriate move. It was dark, and he had pulled his car over to the side of the desolate country lane. I screamed and went ballistic, which must have taken him aback, as he quietly drove me home.

That is the backstory for this poem. Blackpool Tower is a metaphor, but I won’t explain and ruin the images your mind will weave as you read!

The layby takes me back 
to the lanes not lit up 
like Blackpool Tower, where I fell, 
illuminated by blown bulbs.

I should not have been hitching rides
with dirty men, him telling me 
we couldn’t make babies 
with his thing choked in rubber.

His death would be better.
I would prefer a cadaver.
Stiff fingers, curled, like questions.

His wife.
Evenings, he slipped into her.
The usual in, out, in, out.
Nothing in it for her. 
Never is.


Copyright © Sarah Drury 2022