Kevin Ireland Poetry Competition - winning poem by Riemke Ensing

A different kind of Hemingway episode  -

after reading ‘There Is Never Any End to Paris.’

  

Thinking of Bill  [1920-2009]

 Conditions for writing could not have been more dangerous.

There was the year you died

and then another and another year.

Everything froze over.

Grief was deep and nothing seemed bound to earth.

Whole hillsides came down in a rush.

I hardly wrote at all

but stars were close and very bright

lucent through the open window

as though death were normal and every day

without this desperation or desire.

There was wind too and rain

and much silence being solitary.

And all the time there were birds.

The trees full of them, and the garden.

Musicians in white ties, fiercely fast,

chatting, whistling, making passes at each other

as though it were spring and not this depth of winter

with life almost at standstill.

©Riemke Ensing

Footnote:
Full report on the competition here.