CHRISTIAN WARD

 

The Slow Dreams Of Pines

 

Take me away from the city moving faster than bullets. Take me to the place where fields melt into sunsets beautiful like hot honey, where the wild horses nibble at the horizon, where the herons guard the rivers like stout watchmen, and the ponds are full of next year's frogs. Take me there. Take me to the place where pine trees hug the landscape, and the forest floor is littered with the remnants of their dreams. Take me there, and let me sleep under their arms - that place so warm the stars lower themselves out of jealousy.

 

Perception

 

A man accidentally wore his watch upside-down and everything went topsy turvy. Literally. The sun sported a bushy toupee of cloud, the pavements were the sky, and almost everyone looked very, very confused. The only people who seemed fine with the sudden shift of perspective were the artists. They enjoyed walking like flamingos, floating in their apartments like astronauts, and feeling the snow globes of their brains be a little bit more magical.

 

Unsettled

 

A night's worth of unsettling weather:

lizard-tongued lightning, hail pelted

like stones from a disappointed lover,

floods of rain escaping a teenager's poem.

The gods are throwing out their toys,

oblivious to the ants on the carpet.

 

CHRISTIAN WARD

 

CHRISTIAN WARD is a UK-based poet with work forthcoming in Acumen, Spelt, Dream Catcher, and Dreich. He was longlisted for the 2023 Aurora Prize for Writing, shortlisted for the 2023 Ironbridge Poetry Competition and 2023 Aesthetica Creative Writing Award, and won the 2023 Cathalbui Poetry Competition.