Today’s choice
Previous poems
James Norcliffe
Sarsaparilla Road
travels through swamps
and reeds, over a black
water creek and a narrow bridge,
past the swift river with all
of its snags and eddies,
through the winding gorge
of slippery-back slopes,
scarps of limestone
and galloping gorse
to where children parked
in cars wait and wait under
a deepening sky, pink clouds,
sarsaparilla and raspberry,
a bribe sweet and bitter
in their mouths, and
still sweet, when they
fall asleep, the hotel lights
yellow in the darkness.
NZ poet James Norcliffe has published eleven collections of poetry including Shadow Play 2013, Dark Days at the Oxygen Café (VUP) 2016., Deadpan (Otago University Press, 2019) and Letter to Oumuamua (Otago University Press, 2023). His Selected Poems: A Day Like No Other will be published early next year. In 2022 he was awarded the NZ Prime Minister’s Award for Literary Achievement in poetry.
David Hanlon
Not in that parking lot,
not in that residential area,
not in that blue car
splashed with mud.
Mana Misaghi
we make sure to pack a deck of cards for the train, or a sunday afternoon visit to the park. the cards will give our hands something tangible to do . . .
Taḋg Paul
An algorithm guides me through the keys
Each stanza nested in a formal loop
Mat Riches
Hey kid, this won’t mean that much to you yet,
but I didn’t taste my first proper curry
till at least twenty-one . . .
David Sapp
Aimless between
Dropping out
Of art school
And absolutely no
Friggin’ money . . .
Debbie Strange
Evacuation
our shutters open
Gareth Writer-Davies
it’s a special kind of empty
the footed earth, saluting the sky
Sam Szanto
It beckons from between plasters and hand cream,
the box bright-white, the lettering green.
Tamara Evans
Travel West. Submerge yourself
in the M4’s homeward drift.