Content Warning: blood, violence
Cherry Doyle – Spell for the Autumnal Equinox
one jug of cider brewed from windfall
this is your blood infused with dew
one trug crammed with apples
the colour of summer burning out in the bracken
one blade a crescent moon in hand
find a clearing trimmed with the memory of heather
how it grumbles at your sulphur-tuft soles
when the sky has a seam like an unrolled mandarin peel
sweep the blade
through the apple’s fat symmetry
gift it to the earth and cider to a tree’s knotted root
can you feel her now shouldering your skin
chill breath at your throat fingers on your scalp
she is here like a sorceress in a shimmer of mist
ready to eat the fading light
to swaddle you in honey-coloured leaves
to cushion your fall
into
darkness
Best viewed on desktop, please also find a PDF file available to download here.
Cherry Doyle lives on Cannock Chase AONB. Her work has appeared in Ink, Sweat and Tears, Southlight, Presence, Dust, The Haibun Journal, and more, and her pamphlet September is available from Offa’s Press. She has recently completed an MFA in Poetry at Manchester Writing School.
Artwork/visual poem: lullaby by Sadie Maskery
Sadie Maskery lives in Scotland by the sea. Her latest Chapbook, Love Shanty, is published by Mariscat Press. She can be be contacted via saccharinequeen@gmail.com and is on Twitter as @saccharinequeen.