Once I stood, a tall pine,
basking in sunlight.
Mare’s tail fronded my roots,
creatures thrived in my forest.
Time has many names.
When I fell, I swam, bog born.
I have been pressed,
like a rare flower caught
in a treasured volume.
Life put weight into me,
I married billion year old sunlight
and held it in my trunk.
Transformed to strata,
then exhumed and scuttled
into a sparked hearth,
I reach for the skies again.
Alison Jones is a teacher, and writer with work published in a variety of places, from Poetry Ireland Review, Proletarian Poetry and The Interpreter’s House, to The Green Parent Magazine and The Guardian. She has a particular interest in the role of nature in literature and is a champion of contemporary poetry in the secondary school classroom. Her pamphlet, ‘Heartwood’ was published by Indigo Dreams in 2018, with a second pamphlet. ‘Omega’ forthcoming.
Foxglove Journal 