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Corinna Board

@corinnaboard.bsky.social

Received my contributor copy of the brilliant Under The Radar @ninearchespress.bsky.social edited by Roy McFarlane. There’s so much great stuff in here. Thanks Roy, Jane and Matt for including two of my poems! 💚🪶

If you’d like to have a read, there’s a link in my bio to purchase a copy.

Under The Radar Magazine Issue 36; The Flight Issue. Cover is dark grey with an illustration showing flying tigers on a light green-blue background. The book is placed on a wicker table and decorated with feathers and a sycamore key.

A page from Under The Radar partially showing my poem ‘Passerine’. In the background, there’s a Christmas tree.

December 20, 2025 at 11:23 AM

Corinna Board

@corinnaboard.bsky.social

‘Swan and Shadow’ John Hollander (Poetry Foundation). 🦢 #poetry

Concrete poem in the form of a swan and its reflection.

Swan and Shadow
BY JOHN HOLLANDER (December 1966).

August 1, 2025 at 7:25 AM

Corinna Board

@corinnaboard.bsky.social

Abigail Chabitnoy 🔥

Poem text reads:

IF YOU'RE GOING TO LOOK LIKE A WOLF THEY HAVE TO LOVE YOU MORE THAN THEY FEAR YOU

The first deer had large teeth and no horns and were not afraid.
The first deer did not have enough fear for the men who needed them to survive.
A woman decided to let the men eat. grandmother decided her deer shall have horns and be afraid
someone's mother decided the men shall eat and shall be feared.
A man thought wolves should be used to cull the herd.
And we who had been catching water dripping through stone in the homes we dug out of the earth we licked our long teeth clean
and set to work.

Abigail Chabitnoy

June 12, 2025 at 12:37 PM

Corinna Board

@corinnaboard.bsky.social

The joy in this poem by Hannah Emerson is contagious:
#poetry

Poem text reads:

KEEP YOURSELF AT THE BEGINNING OF THE BEGINNING

Please try to help me go to the joy that is trying to go to the beautiful helpful helpful beginning of the beginning of the very trying freedom that we make our great great great light that is nothing but the laughter that is fooling us into believing that we go to the trash bin that is your life that become the treasures that live in the bottom of the bin that is your life yes yes yes yes - please
try to dive down to the beautiful muck that helps you get that the world was made from the garbage at the bottom of the universe that was boiling over with joy that wanted to become you you you yes yes yes - please try to go to the colors that kiss you great great great person of the light that is becoming you you you yes yes - please try to keep yourself in the bottom of the bin yes yes - please try to go to the kissing muck that is very true to your life yes yes - please try to meet me there yes yes - please try to bring your beautiful nothing there yes yes

Hannah Emerson

The poem has a concrete form like mountains running sideways down the page or an open beak.

June 3, 2025 at 6:29 AM

Corinna Board

@corinnaboard.bsky.social

So much love for this poem by AV Bridgwood which came 2nd in The Rialto Nature and Place Competition 2024 and appears in Rialto 102. @rialtopoetry.bsky.social 💚

EXTINCTION SUBMISSION

problems for moths
include astroturf and overlighting if moths got problems so do bats so do cuckoos the unswooped lanes the silent trees their body clocks all fucked i am helpfully informed

by the special nature issue of the in-flight magazine. it is time to quit being self-centred and reproduce i am helpfully informed by Brett in 2F i swallow the morning after pill in the loo's steel anchorhold my contribution to declining millennial birthrates i will sleep

when i get there three flights in three days dear god should i change my Shein joggers. belly pains. airport garden in a pod art gallery in a pod vast paintings of grids swarmed over by dots with no respect for lines like life

at its cellular level like germs says the leaflet it is about anthropocentrism about the things we cannot see. i dream on the plane of the earth after the last child and the moths to so many different mothkinds so many little mouthsounds the tick

of corrugated membranes in the hindwings chattering through all the empty Starbucks so many and nameless this time after names. when i get there it is dark at 3pm i think my phone is unsynced i google time now here. it is 3pm. there is a smog over the lake from the burning

trash. we have switched off the sun. the rooster cries dawn once an hour. you me both buddy the clocks in us hushed by planedrone by mallglow. small me once gutted a beloved beanie baby rooster spilling polystyrene we found the beads for years in the weave a heart

plastic-tagged to its crest with a poem inside about birds and a warning about children choking. i am spotting weirdly my knickers look like the antianthropocentrism exhibition. i am trying to dream again go back to that crescendo of ultrasonic whispering

over the razed ground but the rooster cries all day-night like a baby. Siri
what time is it here now

AV Bridgwood

May 24, 2025 at 7:13 PM

Corinna Board

@corinnaboard.bsky.social

Also reading Fiona Benson’s new collection which is, as expected. phenomenal!

Midden Witch by Fiona Benson - ebook version on my tablet.

Poem text by Fiona Benson reads:

Lark Ascending

Up here, the sky is drilled with vanishing holes -
the disappearing routes of larks diminishing to specks,

and late-spring light is riddled with the thrill
of their long song, their desperate incantation.

See how this near lark draws you off, lays bare
its little piece of flesh, decoy in the sky's mouth -

I am take-meat I am morsel -

Watch where it sinks, silent and inconspicuous
in meadow grass, and you betray the song's bright clamour,

its seduction of your gaze up and away from offspring nested soft and subtle in the verdure.

It falls to rise again, as all our prayers
feint and rise and batter, panicked at the door

of whatever wrung-out mother we dream enskied,
and beg to ward off harm from children who,

despite our subterfuge and voodoo, will one day nonetheless
be drawn to their father's house, will fly undefended

in the temples of the air - each tiny, tremulous force
with a vast inheritance of voice, and strident, coloratura cry;

I am take-meat I am morsel - don't look there look here -

May 5, 2025 at 7:55 AM

Corinna Board

@corinnaboard.bsky.social

May reading pile, with a poem from each pamphlet, all highly recommended! 💚 🇵🇸 🌲
#poetry #poetsonbluesky
@jlmmorton.bsky.social
@outspokenpress.bsky.social
@poetrybusiness.bsky.social

Three poetry pamphlets on a wicker table. Fossil Record by Wayne Price, The Age of Olive Trees by Haia Mohammed, and Forest by JLM Morton.

$Poem text by Wayne Price reads: Fossil Record I’m Wind was stammering at the windows all night. If I slept at all it was a half-sleep filled with thoughts that halved into dreams and back again. The first cells divided identically, for millions of years. Millions of years before difference began. Slow learning life. Slower than stone. I would like a sleep as deep as those first fractal animals, colourless, rooted in the dark of empty oceans, carbon-paper thin. Everything in the wind says give me time, I can change: minerals in the rocks and streams; proteins in warm seas; memories; children who will remind us they never asked to be born.$

Poem text by Haia Mohammed reads:

I AM GAZA, I AM HAIA

Daughter of a land that cannot be defeated a voice of a sky that never betrays

I'm the blood that flows through its streets the pulse beneath the rubble that never ceases

every day my eyes witness death but my heart
knows only life

I carry on my shoulders the pain of a nation
and on my lips the voice of defiance

I'm the story the world cannot forget
the sword that will not break the soul

to the world I will not ask you to save me
I will not seek your pity

In the face of my strength you will feel powerless
I am Haia - daughter of Gaza

my voice is louder than any bomb
my spirit deeper than any wound.

Poem text by JLM Morton reads:

FOREST
I

In the beginning was the sun

which begat wind

which begat rain

which begat seed

which begat sapling

which begat black pine

plunged through the first layer of rot,
musk mould, moist treasure on the brown
saddle of the escarpment,

tasting the pure potential of limestone, water.

May 5, 2025 at 7:51 AM

Corinna Board

@corinnaboard.bsky.social

For Earth Day, a little bird poem originally published by Carmen et Error (@thebraag.bsky.social) 💚 🌍 (photo RSPB)
#poetry #Earthday

A dunnock's prayer by Corinna Board

O wingless wun,
god o' smal bridds,
spære my nest,
my fif blue eggs.
Bright sky-keeper,
bringer o' frost,
maker o' hip an haw,
can ye hear my
tseep tseep tseep
in the heeg?
I sing for ye
in the blackthorn
an the dogrose,
in the hazel
an the rowan.
I, this tyne spearwa
so smæl in yur hand.

Written using a mixture of old English, modern English, and phonic variations of modern English.

April 22, 2025 at 4:50 PM

Corinna Board

@corinnaboard.bsky.social

Spot the skylark! (Shame the wind ruins the sound a bit.)
#nature

April 14, 2025 at 5:06 PM

Corinna Board

@corinnaboard.bsky.social

Feeling very lucky to live in such a beautiful place! #oxfordshire #thecotswolds

White blackthorn blossoms in the hedgerow

Two white swans, one in the lake, one resting on the grassy bank. Fields and trees in the background.

The lake like a mirror reflecting back trees and blue sky.

Sheep and young lambs, probably a week old, in the field.

April 12, 2025 at 11:02 AM

Corinna Board

@corinnaboard.bsky.social

Enjoying some beautiful poetry by @sophiaargyris.bsky.social in my mum’s garden. ❤️ #poetry

Heronless by Sophia Argyris. Cover shows a colour photo of a heron perched by a river.

Poem text reads:

Fox Names The World

Fox calls the night solace, calls the stars home-light
calls the clouds her fickle friends. Fox calls hedges hatchways. Her claws chatter like teeth
on roads, she calls concrete strange stone hears her own steps on its grey skin, pauses
scents the air again. Fox knows

some places are too dead to hunt in nothing warm blooded can live
where strange stone rises too tall
leans too close, but she can slip between the jaws of these mountains, find little bits of life.
Fox calls rat hope or taste or joy-fur.

Sometimes she finds other things to eat left lying wrapped in shuffle-mouth stuff that must be shaken off. Fox moves in silence
calls the dark her own, haunts the dimming sky
with her voice to say so. Fox calls the world
fierce gladsome mine known.

April 5, 2025 at 10:14 AM

Corinna Board

@corinnaboard.bsky.social

Found a rook egg on the ground below and managed to not get pooped on!

A rook egg shell held between my thumb and finger.

April 4, 2025 at 5:27 PM

Corinna Board

@corinnaboard.bsky.social

The rookery is getting busy. 🪺

April 4, 2025 at 5:27 PM

Corinna Board

@corinnaboard.bsky.social

Gorgeous poetry collaboration in the form of a plantable pamphlet. 🌱💚 @dialectwriters.bsky.social
#poetry

A plantable poetry pamphlet ‘Hertz’ by Hannah Copley and Alycia Pirmohamed, placed in the soil of an empty stone planter with a stone bird.

April 4, 2025 at 5:21 PM

Corinna Board

@corinnaboard.bsky.social

My #lifttothesky is for @karanchambers.bsky.social and her superb pamphlet ‘woman | folk’ - grab yourself a copy from @salopress.bsky.social, it is packed with powerful & raw poems about womanhood like this one:

Poem text reads:

the fisher queen

i didn't know the right question to ask & so he fished. every day. he contemplated the water, tracking currents & ghosts. out in his stupid little boat while the land withered around us. i sowed & tilled & coaxed the soil, desperate as my efforts bore no growth. i walked the kitchen gardens, knelt in dust & turned its ashy grey, hoping to find dark loam if i just dug deep enough. each time i pulled my fingers dry & grieving from the earth, the dirt fell away like soot. & when i took my basket to the fields for harvest, corn ears drooped before me & i couldn't bring myself to uproot their shrivelled forms. still he fished. when i took my daughter to the woods to forage, hunting berries & seeds like starving birds, we brought home scraps to make a soup that made our bellies twist & gripe. & still he fished. when the grass crisped under the scorching sun, turning sickly ochre before the wildfires raged. he fished. when the bloody flux came, turning our insides out & killing our old folk in its spite. he fished. when our milk dried up & our babes perished at our breasts, wails becoming whimpers before silence. he fished. when my daughter sickened, turning white & pallid, & i begged him on my knees - he left as usual, peeling my fingers from his ankles, rod slung over one shoulder. i held her hand as she wasted with the land around us, folded hands to shoulders, placed the coins & wound the cloth, as i had done for four small forms before her. only then did i walk down to the shore & let the water close over my head.

March 31, 2025 at 6:46 PM

Corinna Board

@corinnaboard.bsky.social

Close up of a wood anemone on the forest floor.

A clump of wild primroses on the forest floor.

Yellow lichen covering the thin twigs of a tree.

March 22, 2025 at 5:00 PM

Corinna Board

@corinnaboard.bsky.social

Today’s walk:
#moss #nature #lichen

Woodland with primroses, wood anemones, ivy covered trees.

A piece of moss-covered wood with wood anemones growing next to it.

March 22, 2025 at 5:00 PM

Corinna Board

@corinnaboard.bsky.social

March reading pile ❤️
@thebraag.bsky.social @karanchambers.bsky.social @salopress.bsky.social @faberbooks.bsky.social

4 poetry books on a wicker table: Offworld by Kirsten Luckins, Every House Needs a Ghost by Timothy Fox, woman|folk by Karan Chambers, and That Broke into Shining Crystals by Richard Scott.

March 8, 2025 at 1:59 PM

Corinna Board

@corinnaboard.bsky.social

The brook and meadow.

March 8, 2025 at 1:52 PM

Corinna Board

@corinnaboard.bsky.social

Spring walk. Muddy paths, blue sky, first primroses and tree hugging! 💚
#nature

Muddy bridge path over the brook into the meadow.

Trees over the brook with grass and blue sky.

Hugging a tree on my walk. I am wearing black honeybee wellies, a dark blue jumper, black leggings and sunglasses and my brown hair is tied in a ponytail. In the background - grass, hedgerow, wooden fence and gate into the next field.

March 8, 2025 at 1:48 PM

Corinna Board

@corinnaboard.bsky.social

Was late for work as I stopped to listen to these redwings chattering… 😆 (Also: look at that blue sky!) #nature

March 4, 2025 at 8:26 AM

Corinna Board

@corinnaboard.bsky.social

Evening walk with sunset, birdsong and sheep. 💚

February 28, 2025 at 6:25 PM

Corinna Board

@corinnaboard.bsky.social

Thanks so much Clare Shaw @clareshawpoet.bsky.social and Anna Chilvers for the glorious workshop last night. I loved spending time thinking about bog bodies, moss and very small creatures. Here’s a couple of moss pics from my camera roll to celebrate! 💚