Magnificently formed, irregular,

Where woods and palaces at once surprise,

Gardens on gardens, domes on domes arise,

And endless beauties tire the wandering eyes –

So soothes my wishes, or so charms my mind,

As this retreat, secure from humankind.

No knave’s successful craft does spleen excite,

No coxcomb’s tawdry splendour shocks my sight,

No mob-alarm awakes my female fears,

No unrewarded merit asks my tears,

Nor praise my mind, nor envy hurts my ear,

Even fame itself can hardly reach me here;

Impertinence, with all her tattling train,

Fair-sounding flattery’s delicious bane;

Censorious folly, noisy party rage,

The thousand tongues with which she must engage,

Who dare have virtue in a vicious age.

Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

Southern Sunrise

Color of lemon, mango, peach,

These storybook villas

Still dream behind

Shutters, their balconies

Fine as hand-

Made lace, or a leaf-and-flower pen-sketch.

Tilting with the winds,

On arrowy stems,

Pineapple-barked,

A green crescent of palms

Sends up its forked

Firework of fronds.

A quartz-clear dawn

Inch by bright inch

Gilds all our Avenue,

And out of the blue drench

Of Angels’ Bay

Rises the round red watermelon sun.

Sylvia Plath

Lochan

(for Jean Johnstone)

When all this is over I mean

to travel north, by the high

drove roads and cart tracks

probably in June,

with the gentle dog-roses

flourishing beside me. I mean

to find among the thousands

scattered in that land

a certain quiet lochan,

where water lilies rise

like small fat moons,

and tied among the reeds,

underneath a rowan,

a white boat waits.

Kathleen Jamie

Birthday Poem from Venice

From this swaying city,

Luck. Red peppers bob in the canal,

Red ribbons on hats.

Holy gold is splashed

Everywhere, as if the first Wise Man

Had torn his moneybags.

Everyone fits in here,

Feels at home. One very hot afternoon

A ghost yawned.

We come across

Two slight acquaintances from NW3

Nuzzling at a Bellini.

Gimmicks as usual.

This year it is illuminated yo-yos,

A square full of fireflies.

Through the centuries

Untold valuable things have fallen

Into the water.

A column lies there idle

And leaves a gap-toothed church. One relic

A saint dived for,

Brought back to the shore

To everyone’s amazement, doing breast stroke

With steady halo.

Today is paradisal.

A cat, five minutes created, sits with a pigeon.

Happy birthday.

Patricia Beer

‘Leave Krete’

Leave Krete and come to this holy temple

where the graceful grove of apple trees

circles an altar smoking with frankincense.

Here roses leave shadows on the ground

and cold springs babble through apple branches

where shuddering leaves pour down profound sleep.

In our meadow where horses graze

and wild flowers of spring blossom,

anise shoots fill the air with aroma.

And here, Aphrodite, pour

heavenly nectar into gold cups

and fill them gracefully with sudden joy.

Sappho

Dzoka (Return)

In the day,

hike this mountain

to find that place

to call home

where you can lay

your tired bones

& spread them

under the sun.

When it sets –