Dark
Rook on the road verge ahead
how casually you’ll step aside,
only just avoid my wheels.
Is that why I smile at the mirror
where you promptly step back
to continue to pick and prod,
pulling at the roadkill entrails
some straitjacket driver provides?
Like the crow, the raven— few
are as bright as you, so dark
in colour and reputation
poem and image © copyright dfbarker 2012
Poor Things
At some stage or another
we all become poor things
The man who once
pulled trucks and trains for fun
in a gown
and listening to a nurse
image and poem © copyright df barker 2012
The Poppy Murders
They have gone,
all the poppies. Gone.
Please, don’t look at me like that,
it was none of my doing and
besides, there’s too many seeds.
You would have to sift the soil
to find them all, believe me,
and you know I’m not that patient.
It’s not that I hate them, who would?
So delicate and bright,
like bloodied tissue, though
they did rather crowd the lavender
last year you must admit,
sort of snuffed it out if I recall.
In the end, with a heavy heart
I had to dig it out, remember?
So, yes, maybe I did strip them back,
(just a touch, with a scythe),
merely to protect, you understand,
that last remaining lavender bush.
And after all, we should be satisfied
that the poppy grows wild
almost anywhere. Except here.
Not anymore.
image and poem © copyright dfbarker 2012
**poem first published in poetry collection ‘Anonymous Lines’, available at amazon.com
* image is sketch in oil
*it’s so cold here I needed something to remind me of heat!
Ciscography 