My Son the Cockroach has always had an eye for the ladies. I told him, ‘They’re not screaming at you, at least not in the way you seem to imagine.’ He’s the colouring of Achilles and his daftness too. They say those copper curls stood out in battle, that and his swingeing blade. My boy’s no swordsman but protection is important and we’ve a … Continue reading Two poems by Chloe Balcomb
The Snow Woman She was a blow-in then, the snow a wordless paper sheet, her footprints the first blunt penstrokes with everything still to write: spring planting, barley sheaves, a bitter crop of stones and chaneys at the turn of the year. Windblown crows dropped in through holes punched in the sky, gossiped year after year. She wrote children, they built the scarecrow in … Continue reading A poem by Breda Wall Ryan
Memento Mori I have taken to scarring lovers to mark my passing as a prisoner will gouge his cell wall for each stolen day. By this I can forestall some jejune meeting where they, glass-eyed and barely flinching even as they feel the blade, forget to lift their feet over the lies. They do not learn; times scours a stone-etched promise, not a living burn. … Continue reading ‘Memento Mori’ by Isabel Rogers
