Today’s choice
Previous poems
Paul Stephenson
Attraction
Like one of those horses
on the carousel
going round and round in circles
sliding up and down a pole
for three minutes
then stopping a while
then starting again
for three minutes
sliding up and down a pole
in circles going round and round
on the carousel
like one of those horses
going round and round in circles
sliding up and down a pole
for three minutes
then stopping a while
then starting again
for three minutes
sliding up and down a pole
in circles going round and round
on the carousel
like one of those horses
Paul Stephenson’s debut collection is Hard Drive (Carcanet, 2023), shortlisted for the Lambda Literary Award and Polari Book Prize. His last pamphlet was Selfie with Waterlilies (Paper Swans Press, 2017). He recently co-edited the ‘Ownership’ (92) issue of Magma Poetry and helps programme Poetry in Aldeburgh. Website: paulstep.com
Robin Vaughan-Williams
I’ve got all this money lying around.
Have you got anything you can do with it?
Rizwan Akhtar
What fell between an abrupt shower
and a sky’s attitude was your memory.
Jeff Gallagher
Colleagues munching bap and burger
thought Ramadan was that juicy winger,
his scorching pace soon snaffled up by City.
Sue Moules
Sings at the top of the bare-branched tree
an aubade to morning
welcomes the light,
early spring, season of nest-making.
Andrew Tucker Leavis
as the tanker tore
its throat against the
shallow spine, as
the village unravelled
Patricia Minson
Between the trees dust shifts,
light fractures like a prism.
A cathedral silence greens the air.
B. Anne Adriaens
The French term terrain vague enfolds
a plot of land I thought at first was vague,
undefined and malleable.
John Bartlett
mornings
I wake wary
of abundance
wondering why I’m still here
and then I recall
all the green leaves
with their hiding birds
Maya Little
I’m trying to stop thinking about what I want to not // be. Sometimes I have looked into my heart and found that // everything’s packed up.