Young Poet: Alex Walker

My friend who is a tree says I am a good neighbour and quite cheerful considering and I like life and things that happen. It’s a miracle that’s what poems are, they’re miracles and I get to write them down. I work to be a mirror in relationship with everything so to tell the stories of the world where I stand.

Strange Winter

river pouring
daily puff of coal
chatter of friends
press of water against the lock gates
overflow
balsamic moon
I am swallowed up
I am swept away in the overflow
of turkey tails lobular expanses
drops of rain strung like beads of liquid starlight
gathering the essence of trees
the inconceivable wisdom of lichen
the blinding luminescence of mossy fingers
‘chuckle chuckle’ slurs the river
and I cling on
to myself with these words
in this day full of life
full of the tides turning
sap rising
seeds bursting deep in the soil