For The Years
Springs
Here returns a sky of broken clay pots, clamouring
for my attention amid the memories of snow.
Our prayers for a crack in the clouds above answer
me in realisations: all of these are moving south,
and soon you will see them too. A new bird breaks my sight.
Summers
A pause chased my lip: it seems you
weigh your heat with consequence when
all has bloomed, and starts to dry:
you said something else too: you chose
to remove the sunlight on your tongue, that thing
which formed a family, pulled us close:
still life streams and we become you:
an image, too: there were once days like this –
our mouths moved and music came:
Autumns
these feet, bridging
something gone and something not so -
all roots return. The trees do their trick,
pretending to die.
Days to come, unseen,
we get on our knees and dry and curl
before the mists descend
with all their clatter.
Winters
January slid through her fingers, weeks ago. Soon there was
nothing left of it – they said „it is happen-
-ing to me too” they said „don’t even panic” but
for one; the days are not lengthening, not
springing up sooner. For her; quite
the opposite occurs.
by Benjamin Mitrofan-Norris
Benjamin Norris is a poet from Bristol, UK, whose work regularly appears in a wide range of literary journals on both sides of the Atlantic. His latest collection – Severn / Sea, a series of symbolist pieces following the course of the great river which separates England from Wales, and the poet’s childhood from his loss of innocence was released in 2014. Until recently, Benjamin was lecturer in Indian Architectural History at the University of Budapest, and now runs and teaches at a small English language school in the west of England.
Work for Monthly Verse is selected through our editorial process. New poems are selected from authors that submitted work for the last issue. Read more authors by subscribing to Fjords.