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National Poetry Competition 1978-1989

A Dream of Langland

Mist over Malvern hills, a death cloud drowning in the sun, A shifting uncertain season, a truth tower toppling. Hob, harrowing his heart out, certain of nothing but hunger. A long lean man, a patched man, a godsboy dreamer, Shivering and babbling by a brook in winter, Anguish of injustice flowing from his frozen fingers, […]

The Flitting

You wouldn’t believe all this house has cost me- In body language  terms, it has turned me upside down. I’ve been carried from one structure to the other On a chair of human arms, and liked the feel Of being weightless, that fraternity of clothes Now my own life hits me in the throat, the […]

Timer

Gold survives the fire that’s hot enough to make you ashes in a standard urn. An envelope of course official buff contains your wedding ring that wouldn’t burn.   Dad told me I’d to tell at St. James’s the ring should go in the incinerator. That “eternity” inscribed with both their names is his surety […]

Fantasy of an African Boy

Such a peculiar lot we are, we people without money, in daylong yearlong sunlight, knowing money is somewhere, somewhere.   Everybody says it’s big bigger brain bother now, money. Such millions and millions of us don’t manage at all without it, like war going on.   And we can’t eat it. Yet without it our […]

Whoever She Was

They see me always as a flickering figure on a shilling screen. Not real. My hands, still wet, sprout wooden pegs. I smell the apples burning as I hang the washing out. Mummy, say the little voices of the ghosts of children on the telephone. Mummy   A row of paper dollies, clean wounds or […]

The Death of Richard Beattie-Seaman in Belgian Grand Prix, 1939

Trapped in the wreckage by his broken arm he watched the flames flower from the front end. So much pain- Holy Jesus, let them get to me– so much pain he heard his screams like music when he closed his eyes- the school organ at Rugby Matins with light slanting down hot and heady from […]

Between the Lines

Words were dust-sheets, blinds. People dying randomly, “for want of breath” shadowed my bed-times. babies happened; adults buried questions under bushes.   Nouns would have been too robust for body-parts; they were curt, homeless prepositions- “inside” “down here”, “behind”, “below”. No word for what went on in darkness, overheard.   Underground, straining for language that […]

The Widow’s Dream

Downstairs, she feels a sudden shift of air. Rustling the fresh paper, he lets it rest; Its great slack sheets enfold his lap like sails, Near the steaming kettle, the loaf of bread, The draining-board. He’s like an architect With plans, his mouth a straight line holding breath, He’s concentratedly construing clues. She wrestles sheets […]

A World Elsewhere

1 The Visit There were barns, paddocks, young fruit trees coquetting in the rain and thrum of wind. It blew so hard the awning of the outside love-seat split a little further every hour. Tall dogs with silky hair slipped moorings by the Aga gliding up to my strange scent; the squash-faced semi-precious cat subsided […]

The Ice Factory

“Not a great deal is known about this minor industry,which appears to have had a short life…”      – Helen Harris, The Industrial Archaeology of Dartmoor A hush like a shut Bible. father: “grace will wait…” The latch clacks. Our stare lifts from our cold meat, from the empty place to the door, and cousin Joseph. […]

The Surrealists’ Summer Convention Came to Our City

We were as lip as the guidebooks to the city. We had our ankle tendons severed to combat the heat. We dined on carp all summer: the magazines were full of recipes. The city fathers talked about a new guidebook which would inform the tourists in languages and dialects for all. It was delightful in […]

Nineteen Hundred and Nineteen

Dismissed from Tlaltizapa for changing sex Manuel Palafox sulked in Arenista. At markets he bought chimoyas, limes and ink from Oaxtepec. Some days he wore his twenty-ounce sombrero, Deerskin pants and “charro” boots. On others Gold-embroidered blouses and red kerseymere skirts. He wrote to Magonistas; “Zapata is finished. He takes orders from Obregon. Rally the […]

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