The Beekeeper

For those who didn’t receive our newsletter earlier in the week will have missed the news of a surprise release for March.

The Beekeeper’s Apprentice by David Coldwell had initially been planned for release in April 2020 but… well, we all know what happened.

Many of our regular readers will be familiar with David’s work as both editor at The Poetry Village and here at Maytree Press and as an award winning poet and visual artist. As David had to take a step back from editing duties for this publication we were thrilled to work with some of our Maytree authors and friends creating a book that has been described as a poignant and beautiful collection.

The poems in The Beekeeper’s Apprentice have been written over a number of years and and are now brought together for the first time. Together they form a deeply emotional sequence exploring the author’s personal family relationships and his bond with the natural world where poems are set against vivid landscapes of wild moorland, remote mountains and tidal rivers.

Featuring cover art by Maytree favourite, Alice Parker and also supplied with unique art card, The Beekeeper’s Apprentice will initially be limited to 100 signed copies so don’t miss out.

Out, out.

I had nothing left to say.
Take the long way:
out, through Oxenhope, out
past farms into sky

filled with curlew, grouse
and clouds forced into shapes
by a wind that beat living
things out of sight, back
into the moor, back to earth.

Out, out, across the moor
I counted the milestones hidden
by the wayside,
changeling crayons, crumbling.

Milestone upon milestone,
cut by ghost hands
that traced our journey;
winter ghostlings
marked by cuts, numbers.

Northerlies turned April showers to snow
as it inched before us like scattered ashes
over roads with the memory
of wind in the lee of walls and trees

and the barriers of modern day
that cut deep into our view.
The milk glass tinged with green
before a landscape scarred
by man. Snow left us,

and we freewheeled from sky
leaving holy ghosts in moorland mists;
our journey slowly slipping from one world
into the shadow of another.