Rebecca Parfitt

    Animals  I didn’t think too hard about the personality of the meat on my plate, until I bought Organic. The rack of ribs I was tucking into was born the first week of February – it was three months younger than my baby son. The label told me the breed of...

Gary Day

    The Work of Hands And once the father frowned As the boy struggled to fasten The drawbridge on his fort. ‘He’ll never be any good With his hands’ he declared, As if the boy wasn’t there. And once he beat the boy For palming a Dinky toy His mother refused...

Chris Powici

    Fisherman After a long, dreich day in the firth – soaked gansey, torn gloves, a few sorry mackerel dangling from the lines – I hauled up on the beach. Thick smell of wrack. Bird cries. Night.                I lit a kerosene lamp, stood at the sea’s edge,...

Royal Rhodes

    Afterlife Perhaps the friends of Lazarus, who died and slipped his shroud, on seeing him might swoon or rush to hear the tales of that beyond they hoped and feared to face. Perhaps some cried or shook and got themselves quite drunk by noon. Or had the...
Pariolodo for World Poetry Day

Pariolodo for World Poetry Day

    I Am a Poet I was made to strum the chords of your heart Your arteries are strings to my fingers All these photographs, still I keep you snapping I am how you get your picture perfect I am collecting moments into stories My becoming is a time heist The...