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      Allotment Service Metal in the sky: ash-cold afternoon The big fork: foot on its shoulder Heavy handed: spearing the heap Slip through tangle: the prongs ring And layers gape: yellowing stalk-work Developing compost: the heat rises Vapours...

    Change The general acceptance of the bicycle came suddenly. People that have helped me on numerous occasions who I’ll never meet: a counsellor, an academic mentor who is also the former. What does it mean to take charge of your mental health? And why for...

      A14 shifting left to right     slow lane middle lane back to slow lane     indicator tick-tick-tick indicator off     rearview articulated truck coming up fast on inside     grey van moves right     moves left again     silver sun glaring off wet...

      Spaghetti in the road I saw a piece of spaghetti in the road, not a fork. That stringy pasta piece didn’t have two choices: a ‘this way or that’, nor an ‘L and R’. It went all ways to show me that time is tangled, tangled as a pocket headphone...

      Mer de Ballade I’ve been keeping a jar of seawater on my desk. There’s a tragedy in keeping a wild thing captive. In the morning, I see the salt-rim footsteps Of a retreating tide, frozen like a mausoleum. Our bodies are two thirds water. The...

      That’s best to try In the magic mirror of competition, you’ll never win, best not to try. You have that loose neck, goosey-goosey, and those crow’s feet around your eyes. With their ebony-haired youth and rosy-lipped beauty, step-daughters are the...

      halfmens namaqualand the halfmens feeds off rare fog that travels inland from the coast, and struggles to seed. she is my sentry to the afterlife: the hills here look dead but they burn with grievances and blooms; they paint their poisons daily....

      Aum Desire shudders like a yawn to my surface, a deep song rising for air – a sound at the centre of myself. Sometimes I can feel it in my fingertips. Other times a colony of nights confounds me and my heart stammers. Without sound my body is just...

      THE PARABLE OF THE IMMIGRANT The mirror lies. You cannot touch the reflection you see. You smash the mirror, yet the reflection votes remain on your mind. In the parable of the immigrant, the hummingbird wanders into a car park & finds the...

      How to Walk to the Sea Follow the footpath past the farm house dodging mud and deeper ruts Pass through the bent and rusted gate the ford choked by balsam and reeds At the first stile look up to the horizon vast grey sea, the buzzard. Ignore the...

      Control Imagine a box, body-sized and you’re inside. You can stand. Cramped. Just. That’s where I lived and had to lug the thing around with me everywhere I went. Imagine having a voice torn out as the words exit. Ideas choke, when there’s too...

      My Mother Welcomes me to the Care Home Come and live, we'll find you a house, you'll have an old time and be loved. You can just sit there, don't lick a finger, there's ups and there's dugs but we've got to go nowhere. They take us in so we can...

      Disabled Person’s Travel Card Council, council, let me on the bus That you let me on last week. Oh no Ms Watt, you can’t go on the bus For we don’t know where you live. So off I went to get proof of address And I thought I’d sorted out the mess...

      Testing times My bones scold-heavy, heartsick I drag my eyes anywhere - to the funeral wax of lilies, to the boastful damselflies confident in their beauty. I refuse to look at, to acknowledge, that Chair, waiting to test. Solid. I won't watch the...

      A movement of flutes I'm rushing. the beer shops all close here at 10pm sharp (that’s unless you're already in them). I've been eating dinner at my parents’ tonight – with my brother and sister and both of their wives. now it's 9:45, and I've made...

      nocturne a note lingers a forward echo from an ancient song the lone woman on the long road carries it on with imperfect pitch a gate opens a door opens she is gone a continent away a man well-versed in parting words hums a tear into his own eye...

      A Scripted Life Each day the play starts over, you making sure you’re not the protagonist, that yes, you’re listed in the credits but not under this name, or any name you might give to be scrawled on the side of a paper cup by a barista to avoid...

      Foresting Grannylou steps into the forest and a thousand Grannylous greet her. A mess of baby Grannylous roll along the forest floor, plum-cheeked and pawing at squirrel tails, giggling at twenty-something Grannylous who slot themselves into...