Helen Tookey

Two Poems And A Sequence

 

Pieris japonica in Liverpool front gardens

 
It has an undeniably Japanese look.
 
It embodies the principles of contrast and asymmetry.
 
Its twisting woody stems are like laid paths in a Japanese garden, that open onto unexpected vistas.
 
Its leaf-growth, lying at different heights, suggests rock-terraces.
 
The scarlet of new growth contrasts definitively with the green of its older leaves, and the cream-white of its clustering flowers is restful, like broderie anglaise against summer lawns.
 
It is far more beautiful and strange than its surroundings.
 
Again and again it is a small but pleasant shock, like hearing German spoken on an English street and being called abruptly into that different self.
 
It punctuates.

 

 

 

 

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