Sue Spiers is British Mensa’s SIG Sec for Poetry and her first collection is called Jiggle Sac. Her poems have appeared in Acumen, Dream Catcher, South Bank Poetry, among others, and on-line at www.inksweatandtears.co.uk and www.thelakepoetry.co.uk . Her work has been included in the Bloodaxe anthology Hallelujah for 50ft Women and in Paper Swans Press anthology Best of British.
November 1987
I come home to visit my mother
driving past the church along Green Lane
where I used to freewheel past
fat, craggy trunks after school.
The acorns have had thirty years’ growth
but still do not fill the spaces
made by the worst storms in my recollection.
The carrion of centuries of oak
like those that built the Mary Rose,
ship-shaped to vanquish Henry’s enemies.
A year later, cut down and dried out
the village fallen built the highest bonfire.
Sue Spiers