Wind, whistling seductive
whispers to barley.
Rustling, swishing whispers.
Sound slivers, tightly woven silk
sliding o’er itself, a slow
undressing as,
the barley faintly sings.
Stalks move, bunched to waves
undulating, pulsating neath
the air’s intimate caress.
Bleached blond streaks gold gilded ochre.
A glorious ormolu sea, softly
sweeping over curvaceous hips,
two fields of August barley, elegantly
dressing
a rotund drumlin with capes of barley-silk.
Golden white the favoured Southerly.
The other nudged North
a little,
green-shot. A less generous sun
graces the sheen of its bristled back
some grain yet to ripen
for the blade.
Both draped capes move
sensuously
each elegant stalk
a bird in a flock turning, rising, swooping,
banking
as one being. A murmuration of grain.
Oh! The Uisce Beatha*
from these shimmering capes
will swirl into tiny waves.
Trapped in crystal.
Refracting ambers, golds,
barley-straw yellows, warm coppers,
hot reds.
Silky, honeyed, smooth
yet fiery to the tongue
and easy to slowly relish
easy as a King’s golden cape
flung
carelessly o’er
his regal, jaunty shoulder.
*Gaeilge (water of life) for Whiskey
***
Michael Coleman: Irish Sea 2nd rate sailor. Played an early part in the successful Irish Medium Education revival, some may say revolution in Belfast. Michael O’Brien of Ireland’s biggest independent publisher said of my prose “Coleman can certainly write & its hard to if it is fact or fiction”. I have had a little success with my poetry & shorts. I has a short published in USA by Pretend Genius Press.
***
image: MM Kaufman
Rejection Letters 