Poetry By Georgia Hilton

Sergei Gussev CC




Madonna

I porcelain, I frieze,
I marble, alabaster,
I sorrow, in stone,
carve me remembrance.

I ebony, I rosewood,
I incense and candle,
I grieve, in shadow,
hollow me sallow.

I sacrilege, I breakdown,
I smashing and ransack,
I howl, in savage,
scream me unrepentant.

I immolate, I charcoal,
I ashen, and rubble,
I muddy, in still pools
soak me insensate.

I dormant, I sleeping,
I somnolent, dreaming
I, wisp-like in half-light
vision me mammal

I greenwood, I garden,
I cool moss and dandle
I, fernlike in darkness,
burgeon me fecund.





c-PTSD as Environmental Disaster

The veins’ dark tributaries,
blooming coral reefs are ablaze. 
Flaming oil on water, you can
see your burning reflection. 

What a spill! You’ll never 
get it out of your feathers. 

Sludgy seabirds, heads 
bowed in despair. 
I’m sorry, my children. 

She’s really done it now,
only run herself aground. 
Hole in the hull and all that 
black stuff oozing out. 

Which of us understood we
built our own funeral pyre? 

Your saltwater tears formed 
an ocean, now slick with
petroleum, and the orange sun
goes down on your marine inferno.

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Georgia Hilton is an Irish writer living in Winchester, England. Her work has been published in magazines and journals in the the UK, Ireland, the US and Australia. She is the author of two books of poetry, both published by Dempsey and Windle, and co-author of the collaborative poetry anthology Sea Between Us (Nine Pens Press, 2022). With folk group !nVerse, Georgia is co-creator of the original music and spoken word show The Great and Terrible Tragedy of the Swing Riots (2025).