A Knowledge of Meadows

This poem was written after a walk near Dronfield in Derbyshire. It has gone through various versions but I am very happy that it has now been published in Artemispoetry Issue 10, selected by the wonderful Anne Cluysenaar. Artemispoetry is a bi-annual magazine of women's poetry, articles and reviews published by Second Light in London - I love it!

A Knowledge of Meadows

Site of Special Scientific Interest,

a sign had said, evoking fences, 

closure, inspections. Not this

damp muddle where air is heavy

with the breath of meadowsweet,

unruly above betony, darts of orchid,

sparks of ragged robin,

hoary willow herb, bloody spears

of sorrel, rock roses: a holy hash

of Flora’s things, half hidden

by high hazel already speckled

with pea green clusters

the milk teeth of nuts.

That’s a native small-leaved maple

and an airy space of aspens whispers

over a hollow at the bottom of the field.

I feel a marsh of past meadows

in me; shift through mist to bogs

of marigolds and lady’s smock,

and rushes we’d peel all the way 

to school, not knowing that before 

schools began, their wicks

lit the lamps of history. 

Now, framed in a gap in hawthorn,

lake bright, pale as bulbs:

a group of ponies, all the colours

of summer clouds. Their backs are bare

horizons, their bellies, globes. 

Muzzles lift curiously, manes

raise question marks as they swerve

towards me, and noses nuzzle me,

hot with scientific interest.