Today’s choice
Previous poems
Michelle Diaz
The Fallen Angel
This is just a woman,
sticking her life back together
after years spent recovering.
But the sky blackens,
everything grows dark and minor.
Unasked for, he appears again.
What instruments does the demon use?
Metal spoons on corrugated iron.
A cacophony of slammed doors.
Which smell does he summon?
Unbreathable rage,
with a hint of sulphur.
What is the essence of the visitation?
All hell let loose in a terraced house.
A loss of compass bearings.
Which God does she call on?
The one she’s always known.
The only one she can depend on.
Will the heavens intercede?
Let’s call it a work in progress.
Michelle Diaz has been published by Poetry Wales, Under the Radar, 14 Magazine and numerous poetry journals. Her debut pamphlet The Dancing Boy was published in 2019 by Against the Grain. Her pamphlet Raising Ghosts was published in 2026 by Atomic Bohemian.
Autumn Richardson
What you are –
bodied light, a store of oil
a hive of warm blood
Rebecca Parfitt
In the back of the taxi on my way to the hospital,
thighs clenched together,
the driver asked me,
Samarth Agarwal
Here — in the absolute zero of space — fireworks!
Look how the crucibles of creation,
those million coloured fingers that stretch light years —
Jenny Scoones
We unlearn how it felt to touch
And resume our separate days in shirts and trousers,
Like hazmats against the sun and its longing,
The moon with its underbelly pulls.
Matt Bryden
Now a blanket is spread, offerings
of chutney and shin bones,
a taper held to the fire
that heats the tar beneath our boats.
Kit Duke
I didn’t know then,
moving for a mouth
that refused to yield an inch,
what it wasn’t.
Janet Hatherley
In my cookery exam, we have to prepare a family meal This is summer and Mum can’t put out her trot line with its hooks because of swimmers so I buy three mackerel from the fishmonger. I cycle to the school bus stop one arm on the handlebar,...
Jane Ayres
& my sub-tropical heart
will punctuate the idea of treacling hope
puncturing the sense of a book
Annette Iles
across the street
I am washed off my feet
my heart
splashes up into pieces