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We keep the tortoise in the fridge through the winter.
We buy our shopping from the corner shop on the way
home from work, as and when we need it. We dry our
washing on radiators. We pick chillies from the medusa chilli
plant on the kitchen windowsill. We listen to the same CD
over and over for days, weeks at a time. We eat chilli most
nights. We take it in turns to wash up. We talk a fair bit
with the curtains closed. We talk about your ex lovers.
We talk about chelonian hibernation and substrates.
We sometimes talk about sphagnum moss. We check the
tortoise, although we don’t really know what it is we are
checking. You put an extra blanket on our bed. We sleep.
From Matter No 9 (2009)
Winter is cold-hearted,
Spring is yea and nay,
Autumn is a weathercock
Blown every way.
Summer days for me
When every leaf is on its tree;
When Robin's not a beggar,
And Jenny Wren's a bride,
And larks hang singing, singing, singing,
Over the wheat-fields wide,
And anchored lilies ride,
And the pendulum spider
Swings from side to side;
And blue-black beetles transact business,
And gnats fly in a host,
And furry caterpillars hasten
That no time be lost,
And moths grow fat and thrive,
And ladybirds arrive.
Before green apples blush,
Before green nuts embrown,
Why one day in the country
Is worth a month in town;
Is worth a day and a year
Of the dusty, musty, lag-last fashion
That days drone elsewhere.
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