Turbulence
The wind pummels heath
and cliff and shaw, whooshes
under lintels. Everywhere
there are jagged edges,
gnash of tooth and crag
and casement pane: they cut
soul-deep, scar like peat hags.
Nothing is bloodless.
The gale blusters round tops,
blasts into unseen ravines;
black eyes glister like bog-pools,
cruel hands claim possession,
their imprints vein-blue.
They’ll endure long beyond flesh.
A savage gust deranges
last year’s leaves
but some things never bend,
were always broken.
Shattered pieces find their match,
grind uneasily along perpetual
faults, then release their energy
to the keeping
of that enduring storm.
Alice Stainer teaches English Literature to visiting students at the University of Oxford and is also a musician and dancer. Her work appears in Atrium, Ice Floe Press, Iamb, Feral Poetry, and The Storms, amongst other places, and has been nominated for Best of the Net, the Pushcart Prize and the Forward Prize. She has recently submitted her first pamphlet and can be found on X @AliceStainer.