A REMINDER, as brief as charming, in these dark autumnal days, that spring lies ahead.
Katrina Porteous was born in Scotland and has lived on the Northumberland coast for more than a quarter of a century. Her new collection, Two Countries (Bloodaxe Books, £12), explores "debatable lands" of both the geographical and human variety.
ROADS OUT OF NOWHERE
These three are sorcerers, conjuring
Roads out of nowhere:
Tommy of White Lea, high on his tractor,
Drawing a gull-road over the loam;
The Julie-Ann, with her box of blue lobsters,
Ploughing behind her a white road of foam;
And high above Blackhall banks, the skylark,
Spooling his thread,
Undoing the dark roads under the sea, and freeing
Summer ahead.
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