Today’s choice
Previous poems
Nathan Evans
Great Depression
If they ask where I am, tell them: I am
wintering. I have secreted small acorns
of sadness in crevices of gnarled limbs
and shall be savouring their bitternesses
on the back of my tongue until the days
lengthen.
But mainly, I’ll be sleeping:
while they beaver away under skies
painted Prussian Blue and Payne’s Grey,
I shall snore under layers of fat and fur
I worked for all year, until the days
wax warmer.
Only then shall I venture
from my lair to take the spring air; sore
eyed, they’ll stare, wonder who is that
creature—so slender, so eager? And
I’ll declare it is I, the grizzled bear—
tendered make-over by my nature.
Nathan’s poetry has been published by Muswell Press, Royal Society of Literature, Manchester Metropolitan University, Fourteen Poems and Broken Sleep. His debut collection, Threads, was long-listed for Polari First Book Prize, his second, CNUT, is published by Inkandescent.
nathanevans.co.uk
Holly Magill
. . .you’re swallowed whole
into this cocoon: pine-scent, antibac and the dry
whoosh of his heater – lean your careworn bones into
synthetic leather snug, . . .
Dave Simmons
My sky is a hole from which the bucket drops.
Like all heretics, I am put to work processing stones.
Paul Fenn
To impress you, I became
a seven-year-old son of Sparta.
A little hard man, crayon
marching down the page.
Ruth Aylett
God had been playing computer games
for a chunk of eternity when he became aware
he’d left creation in the oven for a long time
Chris Campbell
The View From This Hospital Window
I admire an empty bench for hours –
then a glum couple sit to share strawberries.
Patrick Deeley
He sees a stainless-steel spoon
burned off at the base,
a bunch of wild flowers dropped,
Eliot North
Explaining to my little man
about proportion,
he responds with feeling:
a picture of daddy
with thousands of fingers.
Jeanette Burton
What is this, a family outing?
Yes, dad, that’s exactly what this is, I want to say to him
as I open the car door, climb into the front seat,
remembering those marvellous trips to the tip at Loscoe.
CS Crowe
Lines He lived next to the funeral home with his three daughters. A cherry picker beeps in the distance. I cannot see it, but I know the light is red. Who brings roses to a funeral? Rain rolls down window glass, but not here, only somewhere in the...