A milky grey sky
and the power lines are empty.
The swallows are gone.
I walk by where you used to live,
see windows all boarded up.
No text, no call,
no visit.
Unfriended, blocked.
The last echo of a whisper shivers.
Ghosted.
Bio:
Doryn Herbst, a former water industry scientist in Wales, now lives in Germany and is a deputy local councillor. Her writing considers the natural world but also themes which address social issues.
Doryn has poetry in Fahmidan Journal, CERASUS Magazine,Fenland Poetry Journal, celestite poetry, Poems from the Heron Clan and more.
I really couldn’t bear
to look at it at all,
that piece of unrequited love,
that disregarded romance,
that unreciprocated
desire.
I put his picture in a book,
so dull, so tepid,
I didn’t even bother
to finish it at all.
I put it high upon a shelf,
in a place I normally
couldn’t reach without a stool.
Then took a broom of
complete indifference
to sweep my love
under a rug of
I really did not mind at all.
Of wanting not to realise
the shredding of my inner lacing
under the guise of pretending
not to remember at all,
that piece of unrequited love.
Bio for Doryn Herbst
Doryn Herbst, a former water industry scientist in Wales, now lives in Germany and is a deputy local councillor. Her writing considers the natural world but also themes which address social issues.
Doryn has poetry in Fahmidan Journal, CERASUS Magazine, Fenland Poetry Journal, celestite poetry, Poems from the Heron Clan and more.
She is a reviewer at Consilience science poetry.
Double fur to pull them through
a snow desert. That snow in their eyes,
pools of moonstone and gold
arrowed against the cold.
Muscled team-players, a playful team,
best of friends, your best friend.
Six Siberians howling.
These loyal workers know how to pull.
They gather speed over drifts packing
down close, their weight harnessed
to glide in unison over ice-cold air, slide
over frigid rivers, leap past trees
like starch-white spectres
to carry your weight
to your destination.
Bio for Doryn Herbst
Doryn Herbst, a former water industry scientist in Wales, now lives in Germany and is a deputy local councillor. Her writing considers the natural world but also themes which address social issues.
Doryn has poetry in Fahmidan Journal, CERASUS Magazine,Fenland Poetry Journal, celestite poetry, Poems from the Heron Clan and more.
Care provider: Your mother smeared the walls with chocolate cake.
Me: What sparked it off?
Care provider:
We cannot look into the minds of our clients.
We haven’t got enough staff at the best of times.People off sick as well.The quiet room is the place for herwhen she is so agitated.
On top of which, you’re fifteen minutes late.
They let Mum out. She ran towards me, chest heaving, wiping a hand across her face.
They stole my bus money. Wouldn’t let me out. I thought I would never see you again. I haven’t got any clothes here.
I took hold of her hand, pushed a curl of wet hair behind her ear.
I pick you up by car, Mum. Come, let’s go home, have a chat.
Half an old bicycle
propped up against railings
running along the train tracks.
Left to rust,
it has less than a sense of well-being.
Bitter rain spatters the skeleton-frame.
Snow will come, sun will come.
Martens will come to chew away
the tyre that remains.
One day the council will come,
take away the scrap, sell off
the metal.
The bicycle wishes for a finer ending.
Orion
Last night, I saw Orion.
The street lamps were glowing but to my delight
I spotted the constellation.
At a time when the gods interfered with our lives more,
Artemis, goddess of the hunt, walked with the pack,
leapt with the hares and ran with the grace of a doe.
Wind snarled through her hair, mahogany
as Apollo’s was golden. The mist in the mountains
was green.
Artemis saw Orion, demigod and great hunter,
took him as her companion.
Apollo could not endure the loss of his sister’s attention
to a giant who stank like a skunk.
He schemed and tricked her into killing her best friend
with the tip of a silver arrow. Agony and ferocity
in duel, Artemis chased after her betrayer.
The huntress was unable to hit her target.
He was her twin.
Reaching the feet of Zeus, king of the gods,
father of many, their father, Artemis begged him
in the wail of a trapped fox to enshrine
her best friend’s body.
Zeus, stronger than one hundred oxen,
lifted Orion and flung him beyond the sky
in the guise of a group of stars.
Bio Doryn, a former scientist in the water industry, Wales, now lives in Germany and is a deputy local councillor. Her writing considers the natural world but also themes which address social issues. Doryn has poetry in Fahmidan Journal, CERASUS Magazine,Fenland Poetry Journal, celestite poetry and more. She is a reviewer at Consilience science poetry
I Try to Think
CW: Institutional Abuse
I cannot hold my fork
without dropping it five times
and five more times again.
I cannot walk but I can feel.
I cannot talk but I can scream.
Now, I have been put out of the way
to teach me how to behave
in the right way.
But you, your hands so gentle,
your smile so sweet,
take my wheelchair out of the cold,
welcome me back into the warm.
When confusion explodes in my head
like fireworks in the sky,
I try to think I know that you are right
to say, kindness is the only way.
Even when the others say
that they have more experience
than you, that they know best,
that you do not know
how to do things in the right way.
They tell you it must not happen again,
you behave in such a way
that is too soft, you must remember,
the rules must be obeyed.
I try to think I know that you are right
because my legs do so hurt so very much
You, Stay Calm!
CW: Institutional abuse
I can’t do the things
as quickly as you want me
to do them.
When you get upset,
I get upset.
I can’t explain to you how I feel,
I can’t explain anything at all,
so, I have to show you by what I do.
I don’t want to throw food across the table,
pull your hair hard or scratch your cheek.
I want you to see me
and what I need.
Your voice is very loud,
I see you are even more upset
and so am I. Now, two people are needed
to calm me down.
I have to come to this establishment
because I have some special needs.
Why can’t you just give me
the space and time I need to finish
what you want me to do?
The Knife
One sentence,
like a slim, fine knife,
double-edged, sharp,
to cut you dead.
Slips easily to the centre
of the heart.
The Flower Seller at Piccadilly Circus by Doryn Herbst (c/w: War)
Bio: Doryn Herbst, formerly a scientist in the water industry, Wales, now lives in Germany and is a deputy local councillor. Her writing considers the natural world but also themes which address social issues. She is putting together a pamphlet-sized series about violence in its many facets. Doryn has poetry in Fahmidan Journal, CERASUS Magazine, Sledgehammer Literary Journal and more, plus work forthcoming in Fenland Poetry Journal, Re-side Zine and The Dawntreader. She is a reviewer at Consilience science poetry journal.
A Poetry Showcase for Doryn Herbst
Fevers of the Mind 