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6th December, 2024

Friday Poem – ‘Light from the North’ by Carolyn Jess-Cooke

The green smudge of the Northern Lights hanging over an icy lake and lonely mountain.

This week’s Friday Poem is ‘Light from the North’ by Carolyn Jess-Cooke from her collection We Have to Leave the Earth.

Light from the North
Ullr, god of winter, casts the norðrljós,
Bifröst, bridging heaven and earth,
but you may not know you’ve seen it.
Take this sleekit dark, cloud-scrubbed
save a curious ribbon of smoke-light
arching from one horizon to another: leave your
shutter open and smoke will skein
the black, moss-green and spectral. Or
risk the cold and wait – living flames,
night rainbow, might yet unspool,
bridging the distance home.