Poetry by Cherry Doyle: Wild Harvest

Wild Harvest

Cast your nets to the wind, pull in the raven’s scold,
the swallows’ calls rolling away like beads, a shiver of grasshoppers.

Gather up the silk-skirt flick of harebells, 
gold nuggets of August grass, meshed sticklebacks of gorse.

Harvest the dusk-ripened kiss of heather,
the grouse-brown plump of mushrooms, white wedding bells.

Put your hands among the stiff sunset of leaves,
twist off the berries, let the dark juice stain your throat.