We stumbled on the pub by chance,
The Chequers Inn, nestled in woods
a little off the beaten track. 

We talked about the Wild Service Tree —
I told you how I’d searched for it
in woods like these, so many years ago,
with another man, long gone,

then remembered the pain of that ending;
remembered that the fruit of the chequer tree
is inedible, hard, until it’s bletted —
part-decomposed, softened, by frost. 

About the Author: Tonnie Richmond lives in Leeds and loves Orkney, archaeology and gin. She has had poems published by The Storms, Black Nore, Up!, Dreamcatcher, Dawntreader and others and in various anthologies. Her first pamphlet, Rear-view Mirror, was published Yaffle’s Nest in November 2023.