Sheena Blackhall Poems

Waves topple like skittles down the beach
A gecko is the room’s unpaying guest
Sinbad sailed these seas by such a moon
The old colonial bed stands on stiff legs
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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.
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1.My Cat
My cat has a whiplash tail
a sandpaper tongue
Despoiler of bird sanctuaries
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A Saltire blows on the breeze
Blue ganzies flap in the wind

The sea rocks up on the shore
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The lighthouse stands like an Easter Island statue
Staring stonily into the leaden skies

Wrecked waves far below on the shore
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Owl has been shopping for sweetbreads
She likes things rare and dripping

In her bag she has potted head of calf,
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It's too late now to make big purchases
Old things will see out my allotted span
The fraying rope on the wash line's easy mended
What's left of life I'll spend by paring down
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He came at first to a chapel in France near Arras,
Next day, to a guarded castle at Boulogne.
And lay in this chapelle ardente overnight,
Soldiers awarded the Légion d'Honneur stood vigil
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The extra magic of history's hocus pocus
Distance of time can blur or sharpen focus

Three thousand years BC, flint weapons scraped my sides in Orkney
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Ballet buns twist stray childish locks into shape
Flamingo legs of the young, the pink, and the pretty
Flex within pumps, and leotards and tutus
Pirouetting behind the curtain
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