A study in vertical perspective
During the lockdown we flattened
our gaze, drew the alter of our days
medieval style. Icons front and centre.
Importance indicated by size.
Pets grew vast. Nurses loomed like cloudbanks,
hands raised in benediction or
farewell. Three full moons climbed our roofs,
we met through curtain cracks. We watched the sky
discard cerulean, cobalt, azure; dyed blue
as hospital scrubs, latex gloves, cheap disposable masks.
The galleries stayed dark. The gilded virgins kept on hefting babies
on their knees, cradling
the tender skulls of all the little gods.
Kat Lyons is a Bristol-based writer and performer. They co-host events with spoken word promoter Raise The Bar and perform regularly around the UK. Kat has been commissioned by The Arts Institute, published in Under the Radar and is currently developing their first solo show.
Angel of Fear
He turns up at night,
when clocks stop,
parading his wings
like a white peacock.
Shh! I say, It’s late
and I cannot sleep.
But he is just there
spinning the News.
He does not drink,
puffs menthols sadly
and scuffles around like
an unsettled duck.
I want to scream,
fold up his pennons
and dispatch him home
but he’s too shrewd.
Poetry is easy to write
but onerous to master.
You’re one step, he says,
from playing the fool.
When he finally goes
I line-up my pens,
I string my guitars,
and replay his voice;
I remember then
what angels are for.
They trick our fiends
into wrestling the void.
Gabriel Moreno was born in Gibraltar in 1977. Graduated in Philosophy and Hispanic Studies at the University of Hull, Yorkshire, UK (1995-1999). Doctorate in Hispanic Literature at the University of Barcelona (2002-2007). Published works in Spanish include, Londres y el susurro de las amapolas, Omicrón (2007), Cartas a Miranda (2008) and Identidad y Deseo (2010). Works in English include The Hollow Tortoise, (2012) and Nights in Mesogeois, Annexe (2013), The Moon and the Sparrow, (2015), The Passer-by (2019).
The Holy Vision of the Teachers
driving to work you see a
statue of yourself shining between
clouds you’ll carve this in honour of
yourself if you survive this
job you’ll do this for the others
Mariana, half Scottish, half Italian
teaches one hundred and sixty students takes
care of four children – five, seven, eight, eleven
reads them poetry rides her bike to work
through woods possessed by fire
flies into your office lesson plans
fall like sparks like enormous citrus fruit after
she cries from exhaustion you believe you’ve seen a vision
of God like the other teachers Lizzie Marta
Sabina Kathleen wrangling teenagers the kids of farmers
mechanics ill parents no parents young carers
forced to wear the garb of players in
Gove’s dream the whole world
buckling beneath the stage Atlased
on the shoulders of these children
these teachers
and you
you drive through the dawn
asleep and awake
Will Pittam was born in Wolverhampton and grew up in Staffordshire. He gained his MFA in the United States, at the University of Arkansas. He now lives in London, where he works in education.