A poem by Nicola Healey.

The willow corrodes slowly:
slivery leaves
shrivel and curl on the withe
like dying fish

but the cherry comes alight
one leaf at a time, touched with fire.
Brighter than spring.
Each lucid red oval hangs on to nothing,
like a tear that won’t fall.

As I watch, one leaf unfastens
and floats down

to join a pool of flames.

*

Nicola Healey’s work has appeared in The Poetry Review, Poetry London, The Hopkins Review, Poetry Ireland Review, The London Magazine and elsewhere. Her first pamphlet, ‘A Newer Wilderness’, was published by Dare-Gale Press in April 2024. She lives in Buckinghamshire.