An Early Swim She cuts down her lane like scissors through blue silk with barely a snip; her deft turn at each end is a stitch. One morning, she will rise from the ladder, the pool draped over her shoulders like a cape of kingfishers. He rolls like a barrel of vintage port cast overboard, his crawl Shakespearean in its comedy and slaughter … Continue reading Two poems by Mark Fiddes
Laminations I Amid the crashing, you missed next door’s soul shooting free of rubble deflected off the skip with a clunking blue flash towards Croydon. Perhaps it meant to go elsewhere. They stack salvaged bricks in wobbly columns out back like a garden in Pompei. A pyre gyres plastic black cremating many decades of botchery by innocents with hammers and laminates, as cheap as chipboard. … Continue reading ‘Laminations I’ by Mark Fiddes
For Harry, Wilma & Queen George The company assembles on home turf – The Dolphin. One whisky, and dog tags to help us home. Camel calls a taxi to take us to the start – The Britannia. From here our orders are: pints of bitter only. Wire gets a text in The Crown & Sceptre. Goes AWOL for several hours. Wilco is caught pouring his … Continue reading Two poems by Mark Russell
Another box of nipples arrived today The hospital computer’s gone mad – that’s the third box this week. You stick them on the fridge door, the phone, the handle of the kettle. And we laugh. Then you are sick again. This evening you sit in your usual chair in the bloat of chemo, your breath really bothering you. And me, if truth be told. You … Continue reading ‘Another box of nipples arrived today’ by Char March
Prodigals Friday Night: 9:30 The cancelled train of last week’s lost high now behind us, we ease deep into chairs, each snugging the glove of shared hunger. Our deferred pleasure in escape declares itself open for business with a glass of good wine and a glance that reads my returning gaze. We let minutes pass in this way, just us looking, here in Leeds in … Continue reading ‘Prodigals’: Four sonnets by Martin Malone
Langspiel New lamps for old sang the harp prepare for sorrow and snow for sleeping on a bare floor New lamps for old sang the harp, be glad to eat alone in the cold kitchen to walk by the golden cliff along the sunlit tide line Get used to the hard work of it sang the harp silver spoon in time’s mouth mote in … Continue reading Two poems by Penelope Shuttle
On the Recommendation of Ovid we Tried a Weasel It was the first mammal he ever gave me. He must have trapped it late last night when the moon disappeared inside a nightclub of clouds and stars giggling staggered behind. I found it in the morning, slung like an amulet across the lapel of my winter coat, flattened to a strip, satin lined, its … Continue reading Five poems by Jane Weir
Kissing Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth, for your love is more delightful than wine. Song of Songs, 1:2 Love, I’ve learned people do not kiss in Burma. There those that have been seen to kiss are liable to come under suspicion and surveillance leading to house-arrest or long terms in gulags – like Insein prison near Yangon – or to … Continue reading ‘Kissing’ by Cristina Navazo-Eguía Newton
Storm Thunder is the returning hero you haven’t seen for a long time, the voice in the hall that sends you rushing like a girl, the tall man with the good looks. He’s rumbling through the rooms now, shaking down your attic full of dreams. And here’s lightning, striding like a pair of scissors. She’s dressed to kill. Neon white. He’s growly and hard. … Continue reading A poem by Pat Winslow
