1. Primevère Primrose
first yellow yes
but the very first
rose of the first
spring firsting
(a honeyed fist)
2. Platane Plane Tree
bark peels off in patches
leaving a mottled trunk
(inside spring pushes
out new skins) or
thickens and cracks
3. Asperge Asparagus
sparrow grass marks you
greenscented
leaving its tang in your water
all this hurry into life
(a lily stem)
4. Tulip Tulipe
still life never
motionless but fragile
in wind a turban
unwound (how
far a flower)
5. Poule Hen
women are fragile
on dating apps
and difficult to monetise
(he said) their golden
eggs in a basket
6. Bette Chard
your stem a streak
of golden red on green
(with this resilience
you’re holding on) holds out
against the cuts
7. Bouleau Birch
here’s a silver skin
that peels away in layers
against the pull of work
(hold tomorrow still while I
rip yesterday from your back)
8. Jonquille Daffodil
in the rushes (running late
on screens of inward eyes)
this is yellow still
trumpeting its own face
multiplied
9. Aulne Alder
roundish leaves
waved and toothed
in late green days
(your underwater wood
keeps the city afloat)
10. Couvoir Hatchery
counting the days
or counting the chickens
there you go hatching tomorrows
(where profit is nothing but
your own broken shell)
by Zoe Skoulding
from: A Revoluntionary Calendar
Shearsman Books, 2020