Some new poetry

There are photographs in all the books I chose to bring with me to Finland. Nadja, Travelling Light, and The Summer Book. It’s interesting that I also feel compelled to create a book with images. I have wanted to since Australia, when I found Nadja but didn’t read it.
Here are some new poems I have just written, up with the dawn.

Toi (Finn)

The rims of her eyes were dark for a blonde -

what was so extraordinary about what was happening in those eyes?

Convulsive, crushing embrace,

beautiful as a seismograph behind great thickets of tears.

You should have hidden her from me,

the beginning of hope.

Light Travel

They were afraid of being left behind.

I opened the front door and only then realised how lucky I was,

waded out into the wet night, fascinated.

When I eventually stopped, utterly exhausted, I was almost alone and it was completely silent.

All those days and weeks of being imprisoned in darkness.

I’ve always been fascinated by woodlands.

The rare, furious joy of clasping

their glorious bosoms stained with earth and grass.

The island became unreal.

Was it something about nature?


Sylva Shade

Something draws me to you.
A berried whisper,
soft tongue of pine,
the promise of a bed of needles
to while away some time
in your luscious sylva shade,
filling myself up with your
strong steady scent
that strengthens my muscles,
stretches my spine.

A cool woody balm
for such a boiling heart.


x Martha