Nightingale & Sparrow

Category: love (Issue No. V)

  • Aubade

    Aubade

    Jo Angela Edwins

    You were last night a dream
    sitting on the edge of this tousled bed,
    your arm reaching backwards to touch
    my cheek as I slept and did not sleep,
    as happens in dreams. Moonlight glinted
    off your silvered shoulders. My body’s
    wild circuitry hummed. Perhaps you were afraid
    you had wakened me. You stood, a bulky
    shadow soft-footing from the room.

    This morning I heard a screen door slap
    somewhere. I started. You were nowhere
    to be found in this house, this quiet house
    in which your dream figure alone has stepped,
    spoken, shuddered, stretched out in darkness
    beside me.

    Jo Angela Edwins

  • love – micropoems

    In the leadup to our fifth issue, love, we shared a series of micropoems from some talented submitters:

  • Side by Each

    Side by Each

    Edward Higgins

    “But at my back I always hear/ Time’s wingèd chariot hurrying near. . . . “
    –from Andrew Marvell’s To His Coy Mistress

    When departed from one another,
    only remembered kisses to sustain us,

    laughter at missing one another
    even a short few days—

    knowing the return sweeter for the absence:
    doves returned to the dovecote,

    cooing in our love-nest.
    Will we love each other forever

    as in those endless love songs?
    Not considering mortality’s swift

    undercutting of all love’s declarations?
    Yet we embrace what forevers

    we have. So let us as in Marvell’s coy
    poem: though we cannot make

    our sun/Stand still, yet we will make him run.

    Edward Higgins

  • Breanne Weber

    Breanne Weber

    Poetry Contributor

    Breanne Weber is a 31 year old poet residing in Central Florida with her husband and free-range house bunny. She self-published her first book, real like laundry, in 2018 and is currently working on her second book. You will often find her in her local coffee shop, scribbling in a book, sipping an oat milk latte.


    Works in Nightingale & Sparrow

    The Story of Us

     

  • Perhaps

    Perhaps

    Essie Dee

    A first encounter. Shy smiles, a nod hello. Side glances. Warmth inside, feeling things that shouldn’t be. But it will pass.

     

    But will it pass? 

     

    Distracted thoughts most inappropriate. A click of picture taken in discreet. Avoidance that does not last. Sit apart and glance too long. Has anybody noticed? Then seated side by side, legs bump and elbows brush. That warmth becomes a flame.

     

    Standing near, and then too close. A full body lean, inhaling the scent of one another. Gently one hand slides over the other, fingers weave. Flame burns, breath quickens. Heads tilt and eyes meet, a silent question lingers. Not a moment for witness, unspoken promise of later and parting ways.

     

    Later finds them on a forest stroll, fingers laced. Birds flit about in anticipation, noting an excitement that hangs in the air. Will it? Won’t it? Should it? Want it.

     

    A moment chosen. Gently, carefully, hands find their way. Breath becomes heavy as flushed cheeks graze one another. Spirited eyes close as lips meet and part.

     

    A groping moment before they separate, carnal hunger in their faces. One leads the other off the path into the shade of trees, dried leaves crunching beneath their feet. An old knotted oak is chosen, pressed upon. Clothing is unbuttoned, fumbled loose.

     

    Promises broken while making, making, making.

     

    Bitten lip, bitten shoulder, nails drag down back. Birds cease to sing, leaving the rustling leaves above to mingle with the sighing crescendo.

     

    And then the realization of the moment, no longer pure fantasy. Confusion. Uncertainty. Shy smiles and side glances. Will anyone find out? Is this where it ends? Is this the start of something?

     

    Perhaps.

    Essie Dee

  • Nothing More Beautiful

    Nothing More Beautiful

    Elizabeth Kemball

    I have never seen anything more beautiful
    than the imprint of your breath on winter’s air
    the proof of your life, your presence
    spilling out, like smoke or ink in water;

    there is nothing more beautiful
    than the fact you breathe
    and with each breath
    love me.

    Elizabeth Kemball

  • To a Distant Lover

    To a Distant Lover

    Jenny Robb

    Why hold my heart and love so far away?
    Brief sparks of joy explode and then are gone.
    These winter days of unremitting grey
    are bitter images of life where sun
    is but a memory. Oh, lover, return
    and light shall split the grey. The warmth of love
    will thaw my heart and I’ll no longer yearn
    for kisses slow, caresses sweet. Above
    the sky will break and shine with rainbow light,
    reflecting joy that brims and overflows,
    ‘till barren days and tears that drench the night
    are washed away and cleanse the winter snows.
    So lover take heed and hasten back to
    colour the grey and set my spirit free.

    Jenny Robb

  • Spinning Time

    Spinning Time

    Michael Maul

    You walk slowly. I do, too.
    But my heart still races
    at the thought of
    spinning time with you.

    Michael Maul

  • Wedding at Ward 35

    Wedding at Ward 35

    Daniel Hinds

    For the wedding of Wendy Holliday and Eric Hinds*

    For a symbol of love’s endurance
    Look to your wedding rings

    The continuous, unbroken token
    Of love’s lasting life.

    That love which banns allow.

    Whatever you hold to: complex gods,
    Or simple love, each other, or each day

    Hold to it today.

    When wedding bells ringing
    Intermingle with a sadder sound.

    I look to my brother,
    Writing a quick speech
    Gathering a slow wit.

    The best man deadpans about bedpans.

    I look to my father,
    Farther from sorrow than he should be.

    I look to a bride,
    Nearer to him now, dearer to us.

    Today the thing borrowed is time –
    Spent prudently, buys an eternity.

    The thing blue – scrubs and feelings
    Freshened by tears.

    And something new – a new last name
    And the old first thing: Love.

    *I read this poem aloud at the wedding of my father and Wendy Holliday on the 20th of July 2019 at Freeman Hospital in Newcastle, as part of my best man’s speech (a position which I shared with my twin brother). Wendy died of cancer on the 9th of August 2019 and this poem was read again at her funeral, this time by my father.

    Daniel Hinds