A reading of Premonitions. 

 

Valentine by Carol Ann Duffy
 

Not a red rose or a satin heart.
I give you an onion.
It is a moon wrapped in brown paper.
It promises light
like the careful undressing of love.

 

Here. 
It will blind you with tears 
like a lover.
It will make your reflection
a wobbling photo of grief.

 

I am trying to be truthful.

 

Not a cute card or a kissogram.

 

I give you an onion.
Its fierce kiss will stay on your lips,
possessive and faithful
as we are,
for as long as we are.

 

Take it.
Its platinum loops shrink to a wedding-ring,
if you like.

 

Lethal.
Its scent will cling to your fingers,
cling to your knife.

 
Hive

 

All day we leave and arrive at the hive, 
concelebrants. The hive is love, 
what we serve, preserve, avowed in Latin murmurs 
as we come and go, skydive, freighted 
with light, to where we thrive, us, in time's hum, 
on history's breath, 
industrious, identical . . .

 

there suck we, 
alchemical, nectar-slurred, pollen-furred, 
the world's mantra us, our blurry sound 
along the thousand scented miles to the hive, 
haven, where we unpack our foragers; 
or heaven-stare, drone-eyed, for a queen's star; 
or nurse or build in milky, waxy caves, 
the hive, alive, us - how we behave