Z D Dicks has just released his first poetry collection Malcontent and his second Intimate Nature will be out in September. Dicks spends his time mentoring/showcasing poets as director of the Gloucestershire Poetry Society and The Gloucester Poetry Festival, as well as reading his work across the UK. He has had work featured in many respected publications such as Ink Sweat and Tears and Three Drops from a Cauldron and countless anthologies.
Ladybird
In bed I felt a guest a ladybird
cresting over sock toe and I strain
push chin to rib to the mountain base
black cotton that is my heel
I imagine the climb through
segmented eyes and ganglions
feeding movement the pull at elastic
the reveal of peak and fabric ranges
The ladybird doesn’t see a face
attached to the country of head
as it sifts taps ankle clambers
over pores like a hiker through trees
We share the sock inside and out
both comforted by stitching
but I bend for a tickle in palm
knowing my calf would crush shell
I unbolt the front door prickled
with absence of warmth
mourn heat not given
and sling it to street cold
Z. D. Dicks