Poetry: Chrys Salt

Chrys Salt

Lockdown Celandine

I’ve seen you many times

but not like this

dressed up in shine,

I’ve never stopped to say hello,

never spoke. I know

you come in every greening spring

with all your folk

seen in the swift periphery

of passing by;

I didn’t see

your heart shaped leaf gloss,

specificity,

your sunbright single petal star,

radiant yellow yellowness

fine arcing neck

that tips your merry head agley.

.

Today I stopped to look at you,

beyond the hurly burly time,

fur-tufted stamens in your candid eye.

Ground Elder. 

You are this garden's lifetime now.

Lush leaves conceal your villainy,

our planting of no consequence. 

We would nurture if we could 

but you outweigh our care,  

outnumber us 

march down new planting, 

suffocate. 

We come with fork and hoe

our killer sprays,

our paltry weaponry,

but you, more cunning than we know;

hide out in bunkers underground 

and armies grow. 

We would kill you with cunning spite,

but one stray snip of your infection

spawns insidious embroidery. 

Poppies, self seeded shout defiance 

in your face 

but you sneak in, usurp their space. 

You  walk through language, 

indecipherable; 

You walk through walls, omnipotent. 

Go forth your virus says and multiply. 

Chrys Salt  is a widely published and much travelled poet – the recipient of awards and bursaries (various) including an MBE for Services to The Arts 2014.

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Local 2020 :: Setu, June 2020