Today’s choice

Previous poems

Matt Bryden

 

 

 

Lightly a god, if he wishes, can save a man, even from far off 

Now a blanket is spread, offerings
of chutney and shin bones, 

a taper held to the fire
that heats the tar beneath our boats.
 
A phial of bathwater discolours on a shelf,
unemptied since the day she was taken.

A pigeon in the role of catastrophist at the feast.
And Tiresias there, blindly 

reading auguries of birds 
from the mishmash of their sounds. 

 

Matt Bryden is a teacher and father living in Devon. His most recent publication is The Glassblower’s House (2023, Live Canon). He is Royal Literary Fellow at the University of Plymouth www.mattbrydenpoetry.co.uk

Elizabeth Wilson Davies

There are places in Wales I don’t go: reservoirs that are the subconscious of a people – R S Thomas

Cofiwch Dryweryn, that two-word protest,
white on blood-red background, landscaped in green,

Kay Feneley

Some days I must immerse myself in the waters
These days are more than others

Monday 09.06 – a sewage overflow has activated

Peter Daniels

No, no one is who they think they are,
nor what we think they are, either:
the demon inside is thinking it
and you can’t tell him.