Perennial

Kerry O'Connor
@skyloverpoetry

Was I born for this? To blossom
for every wandering bee to take but never give
me a taste of the honey in return
 – my colours fade –
I have been halved and cored
all my bitter seeds spilled on infertile ground
but there is juice for hummingbirds
 – how they shine –
feeding on my perennial soul.


I am doubling up on Marian's marvellous prompts of this week: Juice! and Halved! in a Flash 55!

Wings & Fragments

Kerry O'Connor Art

A man came to me
With a bird in his hand
Asking if I would trust
My wings to his care
And accept him over the open sky.

A Shade Between

Kerry O'Connor Art

Was love ever this scarlet?
I remember it as salty,
more oceanic than vegetable,
a seagull’s guttural cry,
an oarless lifeboat
at the mercy of a rolling current,
and broken glass at ebb tide
rubbed to opacity
a shade between blood and rust.

Shadows

Blackbird
Kerry O'Connor
Copyright Reserved

Restless after dark
A blackbird flies alone
Where no torch burns the shadows ~
Cupping the moon in my palm
I am the eclipse



For Sherry, after a month of poetry writing, the toads are Celebrating Ordinary Things.
I am on a break from poetry, and have turned again to my inks to illustrate a micro-poem from the Skylover archives.

Sijo of the Season: Vulture Skies

It is the season of the vulture: they have shattered the wheel

of time on its axis: winged splinters, tearing up the clouds.

O traveller! See how they pick apart the bones of the sun?



Toni is our host in the Imaginary Garden, where she asks us to Season Your Poetry.
One of my favourite forms of Oriental poetry is Sijo, which I have attempted here, and in keeping with the present season in South Africa, which is late Summer.
These photos were taken a few weeks ago, when we followed the circle of vultures to their feeding ground.

A Bruised Sky

When your neighbour chops down an avenue of 100 year old trees..

I thought all the birds
would leave the sky
the day they cut down the trees –
I cannot forget the sound
a branch makes
as it tears away from trunk –
Gathering up
the flowers which fell like drops
of purple blood from a bruised sky
I heard the persistent call
of an olive thrush –
But, less forgiving
I have cursed
each man who laid axe to wood
into the next generation –



So this is what happened to rip my spirit to shreds this week - Monday to Friday, I watched as these trees which have been a part of my skyline for 18 years were chopped down one by one.. seven trees. My curse may be as ineffectual as Caliban's but I have said the words.

A late entry for Sanaa's November Challenge.

Untitled (Little Bird)

There is a basin kept full


under my garden tap –

for the seed-eaters’ thirsty beaks


but yesterday, I found a sodden

mass of feathers, beak agape

and wondered how you drowned, little bird.



Marian invites us to write a Fussy Little Form: Cherita.