Art inspired Poetry

 Looking for inspiration it's always an idea to visit a gallery.

Inspired by Ursula McGivern's Koi Jar

Nishikigoi

 

They call me the swimming jewel

and they say my name means love

and though I have evolved from common carp

there is nothing ordinary about me

for my skin is amber,azure,crimson,cyan,

syllables to savour on the tongue

and my gold and platinum scales shimmer even in deepest waters

where I trawl the pond‘s depth for sustenance.

On the surface I shimmy between water lilies

my barbed lip a warning to guppies and minnows, 

danios and mollies that darken my den. 

For I am an opportunist and will take advantage.

Overhead the heron and kingfisher circle my shadow

covet my balletic configurations, my patternings, my scalations.

while landward raccoon and weasel vie over me.

They say I am oily or muddy to the palate. 

They say I bring luck, prosperity and good fortune.

They say I am perseverance in the face of adversity.

They say I can morph into dragon.

But whatever they say  know 

that I can outlive you by a hundred years or so

https://www.millcovegallery.com/poets-meet-painters-2023

Copyright Cathy Leonard 2023 

Celestial Silence

 I don't know if it's just me but when I try to recall my mother's voice I fail. I remember Lily Loughran's and Maisie Taylor's, our neighbours, all now passed on to heavenly pastures,  but not hers.

Celestial Silence

 

I can’t remember the sound of her voice

except sometimes 

when I click my tongue at the cat

or talk dog speak to the dog.

Then I recall the same inane babble coming from her

as she stooped over Nicky, our half breed wire haired fox terrier,

the one she called after The Thin Man.

The series ran for most of my fifties childhood 

as did her infatuation with Nick Charles.

My father, who mostly read Westerns and Thrillers,

quoting Shakespeare, probably Falstaff, used to say,

”Never trust a thin man.”

 And though we mocked all her daft foibles

her Friday night teenage antics for a TV star

she was the celestial body by which we navigated,

determined our latitude, found our true North-

Yet I  remember all of their voices but hers.

 

Copyright 2023 Cathy Leonard All rights reserved