Today’s choice
Previous poems
Kate Vanhinsbergh
We Should Probably Get Up Now
but, outside, the world has paused:
the wind has put down its loneliness,
its fear of never being seen, or known,
and next door’s kids have stopped screaming
through the wall. The cats are curled up
around our ankles, and you say you like me
like this, with the sun falling in slabs
through the window, onto my hair,
my curls glowing orange on the pillow.
You touch my cheek
with the backs of your fingers.
In this room, we have nothing but time –
glasses of water; a vase of white roses;
miles of cotton drawn up and spun
from the earth. I could have believed
that all chances, all paths crossed
were love’s quiet design,
the architecture of its concussive maze.
Kate Vanhinsbergh is a poet from Manchester, UK, and can be found on Instagram @kate.vanhinsbergh or X @katevanbergh
Elizabeth McGeown
The Ultimate Painting - Study for Portrait VII (Francis Bacon) A found poem using the text describing Study for Portrait VII on moma.org Seated on a throne-like gilded chair He endeavoured The image of open mouthed terror is a recurring...
Sarah Radice
Being Autistic I am handed a racket and ushered onto court. An avid tennis fan, I am awed by being in the place champions are made. But I realise that, although I’ve grasped most of the rules by watching tournaments on tv - in the safety of my...
Sarah J Bryson
Knitting It’s Grandma Gibson who starts me off gently correcting me, praising the stitches pointing out how it’s written on the pattern. Shows me how to cast on. Then Mum’s Mum, Grandma Gasson tries to improve my grip, gets me to wrap the wool...
Gareth Writer-Davies
Kenwood Chef I blow dust (an epidermis of powdered sugar) from the plastic body and think of what Mother conjured from spatula whip and grinder (each task with its own attachment) never tiring helping hands that saved time for the hundred and one...
D. Parker
D. Parker spends most of her days surrounded by books both at work and at home. In her free time she reads and occasionally lets words form on paper.
Lydia Harris
weather forecast for the funeral there is a chance of deer grazing of mica rising in stone of knee deep sphagnum of two blank pages there is a chance of roses of lips being sealed of starling clouds yielding of a gurgle in the ditch of snipe...
Anna Maria Mickiewicz
The state of war For Ukraine Storm. Broken spruces like matches In the Estonian forest. Spruces or pines? Broken our souls, Those, who did pass across, will not understand… Those, who did not pass across, will not understand As well ...
Sam J Grudgings
The birds are spies, they report to the trees The birds don’t grant the day without sacrifice. We feed them gold bullion in place of corn. We are starving. We gift them an audience to our momentary. Tomorrow has gone, so we offer air burials as...
Ilse Pedler
Jed of the Dodgems My brother said you can’t make a mountain out of a sow’s arse and at sixteen he ran away to join the fair; changed his name from Gordon to Jed of the Dodgems, grew his hair, slicked it back with Brylcreem perfected the art of...