FLOWERS - WALKING WITH MY MOTHER


Spring is finally arriving in our corner of Spain, the breeze has changed from bracing to warm and birdsong and the buzzing of insects can be heard from the patios and rooftops. The ‘campo’ is greening and wild spring flowers colour the hillsides and olive and almond groves after the winter drought was broken with a few weeks of welcome rain. I appreciate being able to walk out and be amongst this natural beauty but find as so often my mind is drawn back to Warwickshire and my childhood haunts. I love the litany of flower names, recited on country walks with my mother. She loved flowers, both wild and in her garden and they live on in my memories.
  

FLOWERS - WALKING WITH MY MOTHER


Buttercups held under chin,
gold reflecting love of butter,
melting on Sunday’s marmite toast.

Puckered face concentrates as
pearl nails pinch daisy stems,
crowned on child’s tossed curls.

Jump over marsh marigolds
lining damp ditches, sticklebacks
in jam jars at Barston Ford.

Celandine stars winking
from mossed leaf hearts,
shining in late winter gloom.

Blush of pink campions,
dotting thorny hedgerows
like fresh freckles on green limbs.

Primrose tapestry laid beneath
churchyard yews, spreading
sunshine over lichened graves.

Hide in flush of sweet blossom,
weeping boughs of cherry petals
brushing tufted grass mat.

Watch bluebells sway in Crackley Woods,
May flurry of flower magic,
sea and sky united under aging Oak.

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