December 2018
Somewhere Else Writers now have a slot in Cirencester Scene, a monthly magazine delivered to 12,000 homes in the Cirencester area.
Poetry by Frank McMahon
Early Morning Frost
Frost across the ground, a magpie
sitting on the bare fretwork of an oak;
a shaft of sunlight warms my neck
and brightens on the shrunken pond
its meagre lid of rime.
Shifts, movements
in the ice-melt, a subtle agitation
of familiar patterns,
like roles recast in domestic spaces
boundaries contested and redrawn.
I move to gain another view,
folding what I see into silence.
WORDSMITHS
Letters inscribed in air; branches
write the seasons and their fickle
variations, shredding coherence
as they thresh and whine, blasts and rants
of leaves and barren seeds.
Gift of the wasp’s gall: indelible
tales from the oak’s heart and hearing;
grand hotel and shelter, shade for
transient languor. Acorn fall.
Sap retreats slow to reticence.
Meditation under rimed sky,
the hermit’s calligraphy spread
across the crystal sheet, utterance
of promise laid in autumn’s scatter.
The year turns; dew-varnished beech glints
with angled light. Decipher the forest’s
library: curlicues unfurling
on spring-dancing branches, stickiness
and insect hum, in April’s breeze
the Book of Kells unscrolling.
THE OLD CAULDRON
Running round and round the rim of excitement;
the old cauldron found and burnished bright,
simmering with wishes and bubbling soft,
like hoof beats through winter clouds, the hovering
hush while a door is opened,
the soft press of gifts around the festive
tree with timeless care, the whisper of
the closing door. A tug on reins, then
starlight returns to the sleeping house.
Until.
Somewhere Else Writers Group 