Sheena Blackhall Poems

Stumble stones.
Memorials to those transported off to extinction
Murdered by the Nazis
People like you, like me
...

The pangolin has a scaly chin and a terribly pointy nose
In his scaly skin beats a heart of tin and he squeaks wherever he goes

He loved to play on a mandolin that puts a grin on his face
...

God only likes nice girls and tidy boys,
But you sat down with me, un-nice, no-good
In a way that nobody's parents ever would.
...

The bus stalled at a pot-hole
I watched through the steamed-up window
An old woman pause to squat.
Lifting her colourful sari
...

Moon snags on branches,
Stars are snow seeds
Blown across the black-bull hide of night;
Earth catches paw-prints
...

Into the silent water, slips the silent prow
Lifting the dripping anchor over the tilting bow.

There's no star on the skyline, past the silver moon
...

The citadels of sand rise up
Magnificent and grand:
And every step of crystal glass
Towers up above the years of grass
...

Tho I've never met it, I know that Heaney's pen
Is whimsical. It's got a mind of its own,
One of those lyrical trap door minds
You walk across, and Poof you're in the basement.
...

Hedgehog, the mouse-eared prickle-back breaks cover
His ploughshare nose sheers through the silky grass
His hog-snout scoops up nosegays of the wood
Mould, moistness, mushrooms, drops of moon-made dew.
...

In the middle of the night
Hear the fretful feet of vole
Fox has put a crimson sash
In the velvet side of mole.
...