Ariel Road
NW6, too early for the Thameslink,
you’re blushing in a boyfriend coat,
missing him, already-bursting about
Paris in this strangest mid-March but
the tree isn’t holding onto bereft, it’s
brash in its blossom, branching up,
spores hooking onto a pale rider sky,
brunching before Spring – no regrets,
Camden queens’ you are, turning life
at this corner full of wondrous future,
all balmy betwixt stasis I’m thinking
stone and waterline, far from tor or sea
Julie Hogg is published in many literary journals and anthologies. Her debut pamphlet, Majuba Road, is available from Vane Women Press.