by Helen Ivory | Jan 26, 2017 | 2017 poetry picks, Prose & Poetry
Broken He was a reassembly job. A fixer-upper. A jigsaw puzzle. At first I tried with stitches while he slept; my mother had taught me how to sew when I was a little girl and I knew all the different patterns but none of them held. He shuffled...
by Helen Ivory | Jan 25, 2017 | Prose & Poetry
One last goodbye to start You board a plane set into a bevel-edged hum of concrete; it has spread its enormous metal wings into the inkspill of this, your last English night: damp chill and dryskin hands like rustle-paper, now you ‘taxi’ (how...
by Helen Ivory | Jan 24, 2017 | Prose & Poetry
Bare I can’t bear the way she looks at you. The hold of her petalled lips, curled into a plea- -ease me tonight, pout. And her horn-ed trimmed eyes, all plucked slices of honey this, excreting crème patisserie. Icing, sweet violet tip – flicks of...
by Helen Ivory | Jan 23, 2017 | Prose & Poetry
Seagulls When I phoned her last week she said the weekdays were OK, but the weekends were tough, especially Sunday, Sundays were the worst. She said Sundays were an empty day if you had no God to fill it. She said people kept telling her to keep...
by Helen Ivory | Jan 22, 2017 | Prose & Poetry
Exile Foolish: to not know how to work your own wings. On the ground, people stare, they can see them protruding. You keep them concealed, as best you can, but now and then a feather falls, almost giving the game away. It’s not that they’ve never...
