Bernadette Ni Riada is a native of –and lives- in Co. Kerry.
Some of the journals and magazines that have published her work:
Poetry Ireland Review, Still In The Dreaming (anthology), The Haibun Journal, Poetry Breakfast, Ireland’s Eye, Seashores, Drifting Sands, Contemporary Haibun Online.
She has frequently read her work on her local radio station, – Radio Kerry.

DANCING WITH LEAVES

Trees are casting off their leaves to the wind.
Floating above my head
masses of red, orange,
yellows, some still green.
I raise my arms,
cast off and mingle in.
Twirling until I’m
locked in,
in the centre of the spin.
I reach out
but they,
drift into a place beyond.

Now, in a still autumn day
brittle and brown they are lulled
into abeyance around my feet.
Winds will rouse them
once more
and dance them
to the final resting place.
I set aside the rake
lean against the nearest trunk
my thoughts patching up
the ravelled fragments of dreams.