Ys, Ys Yes, I am the seabirds washed inside-out, the stained-glass sea, yawning roofless walls. Yes, your calls ring straight to voicemails, you can barely hear my recording yapping over the waves. Yes, the proofer has vanished, his pen unable to underline typos yet my skin is littered with deaths. Yes, I timed out and rose in multiples, each footstep is now visible on the … Continue reading ‘Ys, Ys’ by Claire Trévien
Two poems from Spacecraft, Penned in the Margins, May 2016 I’ve Carried a Door On My Back for Ten Years You lugged it from the builder’s yard. Now it’s my turn to know its stiff weight, the slow chafe of pine against vertebrae: a decade-long kiss, flush with splinters. I closed it when I left. The lock snicked. Then I noticed it hitching a … Continue reading Two poems by John McCullough
Violet violent as an ‘ultra’ or inviolate as a saint? The reverbs from a viola playing purple passages. A Parma Violet on your tongue, like the contents of your grandma’s handbag, reminding you that childhood is neither sweet nor sour and never tastes quite right; the elusive umami of mommy and daddy. A triolet seems apposite but th’imperial cloak will not be hemmed by … Continue reading A poem from ‘Sunspots’ by Simon Barraclough
Whales Whales lived under our house making the hinges rock, splitting cups and cheeks. Stray socks melted in their comb-mouths their fins sliced through conversations, we found bones in our cups of tea. Most of the time they just wanted to play bounced against bookshelves, snorted leaks, threw bodies across the room. No one believed me of course, the carpet looked too smooth to hide … Continue reading ‘Whales’ by Claire Trévien
