Waiting
The water meadows
are waiting
for the storks to return
always invisible
the other side
of her face
in this book
there is snow
on every page
even an old potato
can be turned
into a Christmas stamp
the naming of colours
is not a science.
I vote for bird’s nest grey
Fokkina McDonnell has two poetry collections (Another life, Oversteps Books Ltd, 2016; Nothing serious, nothing dangerous, Indigo Dreams Publishing Ltd, 2019) and a pamphlet A Stolen Hour (Grey Hen Press, 2020). Poems have been widely published and anthologized. She received a Northern Writers’ Award from New Writing North in 2020.