Radio Nights I slide down deep beneath the covers output may be subject to further interruptions on the subject of snow turn dials by torchlight prop the heavy radio knobs for eyes, large square battery for heart on bent knees the nylon sheet crackles with static imagine Luxembourg as a party shape at the far side of the car park the blue vinyl … Continue reading Two poems by Julia Webb
The Cottage in the Wood Be careful of the stories you keep, my mother said. Peel back their metaphors and check under their skins before you put them into your basket. Mother forgets, sometimes, the basket, the tightness of its weave, how big its handle. Life was simpler under lamp-posts. It’s hard to remember when Mother stopped dropping breadcrumbs. Only that the birds … Continue reading Two poems by Hannah Linden
Earplugs Some mornings I wake up, find them pressed into my hair, dangling like two small clumps of snow on the ears of a cocker spaniel. I’d like to ask him upstairs as he enters his flat, to please switch off your gristly cough and mute your feet. I know silence, I held it in my hands once: a one-sided 7” single – so blasphemous … Continue reading Two poems by Stuart Mckenzie
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
