All My Friends Are Getting Sick

Resisting arrest within six-sided
isolation channels neatly stacked.

All flesh is woodworked; index finger
to thumb pinched in gluey press

Blister pack resentment, as gospel song,
as holy hands conjure heavy touch.

Our future a knuckling of ice soaked
deep blue. Young resignation animal.

Under bloody bones, a snuffing out of
moons terse light. Thirteen orbits or

thirteen chances for redemption sniffed
as clots into cavity. Volcanic black blood.

Wilful ignorance is a vile split tongue.
The analogue voice of a talking clock.

 

Stuart McPherson is a prize-winning poet from the UK. Recent poems have appeared in Butcher’s Dog Magazine, Bath MaggPoetry Wales, and Anthropocene. A debut full length collection Obligate Carnivore was published by Broken Sleep Books in August 2022. In October 2022, Stuart was the winner of the Ambit Annual Poetry Competition.

Twitter: @theeabsentee