Category: Oversteps Books

The Midnight Hare

~ oxfordbrookesuni

Gold-foot, loping, leaping to light,
twisting to the smile on the silent field,
flying to the drum of the full moon dance,
hops the hedge, legs spread loose,
lank, then taut, tight, sprightly
springs, flips to her form, then:
still.

           Spellbound, sleek, almost
invisible, low on dark ground,
inscrutable hieroglyph of being, seeing
secrets deep behind honey eyes,
old as time, cold as stone,
alone with night, a million stars,
counting.

           Up again, snatched from dreams,
darting to the mewse, the Old Ways,
pitched like a soft stone, silhouetted
on rising silver, high over water,
low across earth, drawn to the down,
the husk hushed, then wild, moonstruck,
shadow boxing things unseen.

by Oz Hardwick

‘The Midnight Hare’ is copyright © Oz Hardwick, 2010. It is reprinted from The Illuminated Dreamer by permission of Oversteps Books.

Notes from Oversteps:

Oz Hardwick, a York-based writer, photographer, lecturer and musician, has published widely, including two previous collections. He also writes on art and literary history, and is Professor of English at Leeds Trinity University College. As Paul Hardwick, he has recently published an impressive book about English misericords, English Medieval Misericords: The Margins of Meaning (Boydell Press, 2011). You can read more about Oz Hardwick at this link, find out more about his music here, and read a further poem from The Illuminated Dreamer at this page.

Oversteps Books publishes some of the best in contemporary poetry, covering a wide range of established and new poets. There is a rigorous editorial policy, and the books are produced to the highest standards both in terms of editorial accuracy and the beauty of the finished books. Oversteps poets also give regular poetry readings at festivals and other events. Oversteps Books was founded in 1992 by the poet and translator, Anne Born. The poet and lecturer, Alwyn Marriage, became Managing Editor in 2008. You can find out more about the press and sign up for Oversteps’s mailing list here.

Copyright information: please note that the copyrights of all the poems displayed on the website and sent out on the mailing list are held by the respective authors, translators or estates, and no work should be reproduced without first gaining permission from the individual publishers.

River is the Plural of Rain

~ oxfordbrookesuni

Each of us is water    Carole Satyamurti

From a mouth of soil among sedge and willow
water calls out on its journey
to all its other selves: follow

follow us from the shallows into the deep. Below
the surface currents strain their sinews
spilling white foam over stones to follow

the earth vein where it flows,
furling and ravelling together
as stream follows after stream. 

Its pulse is the undertow,
its pores are the rain,
and every drop is dreaming of sky.

by Rebecca Gethin

‘River is the Plural of Rain’ is copyright © Rebecca Gethin, 2009. It is reprinted from River is the Plural of Rain by permission of Oversteps Books.

Notes from Oversteps:

Rebecca Gethin’s first collection, River is the Plural of Rain, named after this poem, was published in 2009 by Oversteps Books. Rebecca lives on Dartmoor in Devon, but also returns frequently to the mountainous valley in Italy where her ancestors lived. She teaches poetry at Dartmoor Prison, and has recently published her first novel, Liar Dice. You can find out more about Rebecca Gethin at this link, where you can also read another poem from the collection.

Oversteps Books publishes some of the best in contemporary poetry, covering a wide range of established and new poets. There is a rigorous editorial policy, and the books are produced to the highest standards both in terms of editorial accuracy and the beauty of the finished books. Oversteps poets also give regular poetry readings at festivals and other events. Oversteps Books was founded in 1992 by the poet and translator, Anne Born (1924–2011). The poet and lecturer, Alwyn Marriage, became Managing Editor in 2008. You can find out more about the press here, and sign up for Oversteps’s mailing list.

Copyright information: please note that the copyrights of all the poems displayed on the website and sent out on the mailing list are held by the respective authors, translators or estates, and no work should be reproduced without first gaining permission from the individual publishers.