Kerry Darbishire, songwriter and poet, grew up in the Lake District where she continues to live, find inspiration and write in a wild area of Cumbria. Her poems have appeared widely in anthologies and magazines and have won or been listed in several competitions, including the Bridport shortlist 2017, and the 2018 PBS Mslexia Poetry Competition. Her first poetry collection, A Lift of Wings, was published in 2014 by Indigo Dreams. A biography, Kay’s Ark, the story of her mother, was published in 2016 by Handstand Press. www.handstandpress.net.
Her second poetry collection, Sweet on my Tongue, was published by Indigo Dreams in 2018 and is a finalist in the Cumbria Culture Awards 2019. She co-edited the new Handstand Press Cumbrian Poetry Anthology, This Place I know. Kerry is currently working on a pamphlet and a new full collection.
Cloudburst
You bring the worst
rain-loosened slopes
gravel-bind and dirt
bracken shredded wire and mud
the sigh of summer
paths rolled to rubble
stained fleece and turf
injected earth
a smell a taste that I can’t name
brash and stones to jam gates and streams
things birds-of-prey leave behind
for us to find in dreams
you bring disturbing trash carcasses and bones
and from the shoulder of the fell
a robin’s song tangled weave
my geese and dogs a dying frog
one last yellow rose heather harebells
ripe walnuts thrown to the floor
like dice the fear
of drowning to my door
to mice and moles once safe and dry
water pipes for homes
you bring a squall the greyest cry
like hawk wings tearing from the sky
Kerry Darbishire