Mum tells of no moon tonight, as if it’s been lost,
as if the darkness will never rise and the sun will weep
at the thought of never catching another break.

We cut an apple tree in the back shadow of the front garden
yesterday but left the root, to remind it, perhaps, of how to return.
Should I have done the same for the moon? Left a calling card
of flagrant fondness for its fine form- a white blemish
on the blank canvas of that all-consuming blackness.

I never liked starting out on white, far too much choice
of where to place the blemish of the first brushstroke
but black… black is where you paint a Pollock.

I refuse to admit we’ve seen the last of the heaven’s eye-
Eden didn’t forsake us- it was the kids who grew bored of it.

The ground trembles underfoot, even here, beneath this house,
the roots are rummaging below the earth and their bloom
will be a full moon that some of us will not be able to see
and the rest will be unable to correctly comprehend it.

All words and photographs by Damien B Donnelly