by Linda Hawkins
Circinate vernation
Here the lushly hurting green
spring spirals hard on hips of dripping hills
wild-unsmoothed by conquerors, old
ferns tendered
back to cradle-coil
Sap corkscrews vines of not-grown
kids, and even the sodden lambs
are unhinged, fast-growing two new canny teeth
to escape the mortal chute
My own fat fingers greasen-soft
from fenceplucked yanks of fleece, rippled white
the curls bleat also down my neck
my neck so unaware of the wire
Pull-snared by colder seasons
tighten the winding-down, that white
wool my age
of hard awareness my shakehands
unsoftened by kind lanolins
Pen, pour out, flood now torrid spring
pin fast that greenwing vital boy, for
swift the bone-chariot ices
my road into the drowsing dark
and all lambfleece goes
to fronds, the curling smokeblack plumes
for all four nodding horses
by Ankh Spice
Inspired by the sensation Dylan Thomas metres out inside an atypical brain, and more literally by a combination of ‘Fern Hill’ ‘Do not go gentle into that good night’ and ‘Death Shall Have no Dominion’
Ankh Spice is a queer, sea-obsessed poet from Aotearoa New Zealand. His work has been widely published, and nominated multiple times for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net. His poem ‘New Cloth’ was the joint winner of the Poetry Archive’s WorldView competition last year. If he’s not out round the glorious coasts of Te Whanganui-a-Tara, you’ll find him on Twitter @SeaGoatScreamsPoetry, or on Facebook @AnkhSpiceSeaGoatScreamsPoetry. Much of his published work is available on linktree https://linktr.ee/SeaGoatScreamsPoetry
Linda Hawkins is a self-taught watercolor artist and photographer, living on the central coast of California. Linda uses her art to express her appreciation for nature, both through the camera lense and paint brush. Her visual art has appeared, or is forthcoming in: Flash Frog, The Jupiter Review, Pithead Chapel (cover), Acropolis Journal, Wrongdoing Magazine, Moss Puppy Mag, and celestite poetry. She can be found on Twitter: @lindamayhawkins and at lindamayhawkins.com.