Bluesky Quarterly Review (2026) #1

January-March 2026

 

A compendium of poems posted on Bluesky in the first quarter of 2026:

 

 

Tasting of lipstick

and nylon –

the kiss that crackled.

 

***

 

Adding cream

to coffee –

first light.

 

***

 

Weaving long,

languid circles – a fly

simply flying.

 

***

 

Low dip and drip –

oars gently echoing

early morning air.

 

***

 

Leaves gently rising

– a soft wind

stirs the ash.

 

***

 

Along the shoreline –

a plover passing

in and out of view.

 

***

 

Raised by the wind –

tattered remnants

of a bleached tricolour.

 

***

 

Final curtain call –

savouring the scent

of greasepaint and roses.

 

***

 

Port of embarkation –

fond farewells and

left luggage.

 

***

 

Moth meditating

merging

into the leaf.

 

***

 

Still trying

to climb this mountain

in my smooth-soled shoes.

 

***

 

Reflecting

in the ripples –

evening rain.

 

***

 

Circling the sea

and summer sky –

a lone albatross.

 

***

 

Softly alighting

on water –

a feather drifting on.

 

***

 

Cutting clean

across my lens –

blurredkingfisherflash.

 

***

 

Speaking

without words –

her black-veiled lips.

 

***

 

Ice cold surge of

seawater, glimmering

across the sand.

 

***

 

Slumped scarecrow,

taking wing –

a murder of crows.

 

***

 

A paper lantern –

the only moon

to light the way.

 

***

 

Winter sun’s

weak glare –

clock chimes.

 

***

 

Morning blue –

moon fading

into cloud.

 

***

 

UV cream

melting into

the melanoma scar.

 

***

 

Lamplight

slowly merging

into dawn.

 

***

 

Leaf litter –

softly filtering sound

from the flow.

 

***

 

Salt sheen –

riptide and rock

savouring the raw.

 

***

 

Day’s end –

we realise it’s one of

our anniversaries.

 

Martin Parr - Bored Couple New Brighton England (1983-85) The Last Resort

First Sign of Spring

Leaf 347 – Art Inspired

 

Kaii Higashiyama - Sign of Spring (1988)

A seasonal haiku, hailing renewal and rejuvenation, inspired by Kaii Higashiyama’s ‘Sign of Spring’ (1988).

 

 

Pale buds

growing greener

– first sign of spring.

 

 

 

Harold Lloyd in Japan

Leaf 346 – Reflections

 

Harold Lloyd in Japan, c.1962

Harold Lloyd was always my favourite amongst all of the most famous comedians of the golden age of silent film in Hollywood. I’ve read several books about him, but I was curious to find a few photos of a trip he made to Japan in later life. I’d love to know more about that trip and the places he visited.

 

 

HAROLD LLOYD IN JAPAN

 

Evening star –

silently sliding shut

a silver screen.

 

 

 

Toy Boats

Leaf 345 – Reflections

 

Edward Hopper - Coast Guard Cove (1929)

As a child, I always enjoyed playing with toy boats – losing my imagination in made-up stories of sea voyages and shipwrecks on far away islands. And compared to the raw power of the sea, real boats can be tossed about and meet their ends like simple toys too.

 

 

Toy boats

in rock pools

on a rugged shore.

 

 

 

Eleanor Hughes - On the Cliff (Penlee House Gallery & Museum)

Cushioned in Dream

Leaf 344 – Reflections

 

Harold C. Earnshaw - The World Forgetting (1927)

There’s nothing like a good book for totally transporting the soul …

 

 

NEVER-ENDING STORY

 

Cushioned in dream –

each page alighting

another world away.

 

 

 

Tea or Coffee?

Leaf 343 – Reflections

 

David Palmer - How to Make Tea (1977)

I’m more of a tea, rather than a coffee drinker myself …

 

 

Red Label (loose leaf)

– my mother,

warming the pot.

 

 

 

Osaka Castle

Leaf 342 – Looking Back

 

Kawanishi Yuzaburo - Osaka Castle (1967)

One is often apt to see some odd pets here in Japan. Not just the wide variety of little dogs that get taken regularly to massage parlours and hair salons that are dedicated to caring for such pampered pets (see, Leaf 281). I’ve seen videos of people keeping otters in their apartments, feeding them sashimi. And I once saw a man out walking with a meerkat on a lead. But one of the strangest sights I ever saw was back in 2009:

 

 

Gazing up at Osaka Castle.

 

An iguana –

wearing a

pink feather boa.

 

 

 

London Lights

Leaf 341 – Looking Back

 

Ronald Lampitt - London Nightscape

An homage to my home city, so far away …

 

 

Lights of the city

spanning the river

– London aglow!

 

 

 

The Copse

Leaf 340 – Art Inspired

 

Shima Tamami - Forest Song (1962)

This poem was loosely inspired by two things: Firstly, by Shima Tamami’s print, ‘Forest Song’ (1962). And secondly, by a long walk to Chanctonbury Ring on England’s South Downs when I was around ten years old. Chanctonbury Ring itself is a ring of beech trees, originally planted in 1760, along the remnants of a circular, prehistoric earthen rampart atop Chanctonbury Hill. The prehistoric site’s exact purpose is not known, although it is thought to have been used variously, either as a hill fort, a civic refuge, a livestock enclosure, or as a religious sanctuary; although it was certainly used for the latter purpose during the later Roman occupation of Britain, with two distinct temple or religious cult-like buildings having been found on the site. At the time of visiting, this unknown, pre-Christian religious association really caught hold of my overly-fertile imagination and I felt as though there was something darkly magical moving with the wind roaring loudly through the boughs of these tall trees and the raucous cawing of sinister, black-feathered crows. Sadly, not long afterwards, the ring was broken, as many of the trees were destroyed by the Great Storm of 1987.

 

 

Wind shivers a copse,

where druids once

communed with crows.

 

 

 

Ian Hawfinch - Chanctonbury Ring (Geograph)

Chanctonbury Ring and other archaeological sites (Ordnance Survey, 1934)

Earth and Sky

Leaf 339 – Reflections

 

Alexandra Buckle - Winter Reflections (2023)

As above, so below ... (see also, Leaf 9 & Leaf 156).

 

 

Mirroring

earth and sky

– Rushmere.

 

 

 

Warmth of the Pine

Leaf 338 – Looking Back

 

Ashikaga Shizuo - Benimashiko, or Long-tailed Rosefinch (c.1950s)

The evergreen pine is weighted with symbolism in both poetry and religion, particularly in Japan – denoting purity, resilience, and longevity.

 

 

Two young birds –

blushed by the

warmth of the pine.

 

 

 

Concentric Circles

Leaf 337 – Art Inspired

 

M.C. Escher - Rippled Surface (1950)

Two circles set vertically and overlapping, rather like a Venn diagram, is an ancient symbol for water – ‘vesica piscis’ (Latin, meaning ‘fish bladder’). The figure appears in the first proposition of Euclid’s ‘Elements’ as a means of producing an equilateral triangle (two, in fact, one mirroring the other) by means of a compass and straight edge. I first came across this symbol and its relationship to water at Glastonbury, where its stylised motif has been used to decorate the cover of the Chalice Well – a sacred spring. As such, it is also said to be a symbol of fertility, and of the divine, representing the meeting point of the spiritual and the physical, of heaven and earth (‘as above, so below’). Hence it is frequently used in Christian contexts, to depict a halo or aureola, or the ichthys – fish symbol, an early motif for denoting Christ or Christian belief/followers. I’ve often been taken by the way in which bodies of water tend to refract in concentric circles, for instance when it rains, and how when two or more such refractions meet they merge much in the same manner as this ancient geometric symbol – similar to the way in which it is depicted here, in this 1950 print by the artist, M.C. Escher, which has captured two ripples, two concentric circles on the cusp of meeting under the moon.

 

 

Concentric

circles merge –

ripples on water.

 

 

 

Saint Cuthbert

Leaf 336 – Looking Back

 

Lindisfarne, or Holy Island

Having long been fascinated by the Lindisfarne Gospels and the life of Saint Cuthbert, I visited Durham and Lindisfarne in the early 1990s. The Cathedral at Durham is one of the most imposing and atmospheric in the country, and Lindisfarne is one of the most beautiful and rugged, out-of-the-way places on the Northumbrian coast. Consequently, I’ve long thought of Cuthbert as the real patron saint of olde England.

 

 

SAINT CUTHBERT

 

Sleeping under solid stone –

 

A holy spirit

borne by the birds

over Lindisfarne.

 

 

 

Ronald Lampitt - Durham Cathedral

Lindisfarne Photograph Credit: Ian Capper (Geograph)

Night Cycle

Leaf 335 – Looking Back

 

Motorcyclist, France (1905)

In the long hot summer of 2003, I was living far out in the countryside, commuting into London each day. This entailed an eight-mile bicycle ride each morning and again each evening, which soon made me fit as a fiddle. Setting off on the bike before 5:30am, I’d usually be home around 5-6pm – except on Friday’s, when I’d spend the evening in the pub with friends and colleagues, catching one of the last trains home. Heading out into the unlit country lanes always felt mad enough, but similarly daring myself to free-wheel down steep hills in the pitch dark was always happily enervated by a little, lingering Dutch courage!

 

 

NIGHT CYCLE

 

All my faith

centred on two wheels –

clinging to my ride.

 

 

 

Free Rain

Leaf 334 – Senryu (or witty, tom-foolery)

 

Sarah Brayer - Bi Bop Puddle Hop (1994)

I realise some people think a pun is the lowest form of wit, but personally I think they are a lot of fun.

 

 

Given

free rain

running puddles.

 

 

 

Harry Wingfield - Wellington Boots

This poem was featured on 

Sean Wright's 'Fallen Petals' Haiku Commentary

Standing on Ceremony

Leaf 333 – Looking Back

 

There is something about a solitary heron which always puts me in mind of the character of Mr Flay in Mervyn Peake’s ‘Gormenghast’ trilogy (1946-1959). This poem was inspired by a heron which I saw and photographed several years ago at Granchester meadow, near Cambridge, UK.

 

 

Standing on ceremony

amid the fen –

a frock-coated heron.

 

 

 

Photographs by Tim Chamberlain

Soba and Tatami

Leaf 332 – Looking Back

 

Takahashi Hiroaki - Country House at Negishi (c.1936)

Revisiting a restaurant, alas – in my mind only (see, Leaf 41).

 

 

Warm scent

of soba and tatami

under thatch.

 

 

 

Paint Pots

Leaf 331 – Art Inspired

 

Rudy Burckhardt - Jackson Pollock holding a can of paint (1950)

A late addition to my previous poems on Jackson Pollock (see, Leaf 134 & Leaf 135).

 

 

Pots, paint

and brushes –

mixing a mind.

 

 

 

Constructing the Quays

Leaf 330 – Art Inspired

 

Norman Garstin - A View of Mount's Bay with the North Pier (c.1920)
Penlee House Gallery & Museum

This poem was inspired by Norman Garstin’s painting of the building of the north quay of Newlyn harbour in Cornwall. As a child, I spent all my summers in Newlyn, and so the harbour was a place I knew well – a haven in so many senses of the word.

 

 

Two arms –

enfolding calm

waters within.

 

 

 

Newlyn, Cornwall (c.1906) National Maritime Museum

All These Worlds

Leaf 329 – Art Inspired

 

Eimei Machida - When We Arrive at the Jupiter ... (2003)

As with Leaf 111, this is another poem inspired by the work of science fiction writer, Arthur C. Clarke. I’ve written in greater depth about my fascination for Clarke’s scientifically optimistic and oddly mystical visions of the far future on my other blog, along with my first, slightly hair-raising reading of ‘2001: A Space Odyssey’ (1968) during the first Coronavirus lockdown of 2020 (see here). I’ve since read all the other books in the series as well. I think the following haiku/senryu, which was actually prompted by seeing Eimei Machida’ s print, ‘When We Arrive at the Jupiter ...’  (2003), perhaps manages to go some way towards distilling that enormous and ultimately unfathomable sense of possibility which comes with a profound and prolonged contemplation of astronomy.

 

 

All these worlds

are yours –

[watching the cursor wink …]

 

 

2001 Image Source Credit: IMDb

Ordnance Survey

Leaf 328 – Looking Back

 

This linked sequence of verses is a meditation on maps, partly inspired by a geography field trip to the Chiltern Hills, which I went on while I was at school. Maps have always fascinated me. We are very lucky in the UK to have very good maps of the country, provided by the unceasing work of the Ordnance Survey, who have been mapping the landscape since the late 1700s.

 

 

ORDNANCE SURVEY

 

Following a fingerpost –

ascending the path

to Ivinghoe Beacon.

 

Tracing coloured lines,

along contours and

converging coordinates.

 

Folding in on itself –

trig’ points and squares

translating landscape.

 

Making sense

of maps and minds,

charting our course.

 

Glancing up in awe

– compassing the

view’s high vantage.