Today’s choice
Previous poems
Andrew Tucker Leavis
Poseidon at the Spill
as the tanker tore
its throat against the
shallow spine, as
the village unravelled
when the sea took fire;
in a hi-vis flower
of diesel light,
he rose.
finding his tongue
tang-stained with oil
he yanked his ankle-chain
to its leashpoint,
cursed this fresh hobby,
held his palm alive
with ramification, above
the pepperdashed sandbank.
unmighty and
detergent-eyed he
watched their wings fail
into swooplessness
and so moving bird to bird,
he spoke his
new momentum
backwards
into blackened eyes.
Andrew Tucker Leavis has written for the Radio Times, Litro and Under the Radar. He was writer-in-residence at Melbourne UNESCO City of Literature in 2024, and is now the editor in chief of the New Nottingham Journal.
Kate Noakes for International Women’s Day
Each year in March, on the eighth day,
the one we’re allowed to call ours,
slowly, Jess reads our names . . .
Julia Webb for International Women’s Day
hoover witch mum / mum on the rocks / mum’s coach horses / all the king’s mums /
Sue Burge for International Women’s Day
speaks whale, speaks star
breathes in — tight as a tomb
breathes out — splintered crackle
Gill Connors for International Women’s Day
Rack and stretch her, loosen flesh
from bone. A jointed bird will not squawk.
Helen Ivory for International Women’s Day
A woman somewhere is typing on the internet
my heart wakes me up like clockwork.
Hélène Demetriades
At breakfast my man sticks a purple
magnolia bud in my soft boiled egg.
The flower opens, distilling to lilac.
Stuart Henson
Sometimes I’m surprised there’s light
in dark places, those corridors, those alleys
where you wouldn’t stray if you didn’t need
Richard Stimac
Trends of lead, silver, copper, and zinc
vein the middle of Missouri . . .
David R. Willis
. . . something, cold
wet and bitter, saline
sided by yellow sand . . .