Today’s choice
Previous poems
Regina Weinert
Shared Attic
A key on a short string unlocks
a metal door to an unlit stair, steep
wooden steps, a turn at the top
where you can’t see back. We’re in The Gods.
A warren on the right, murk-bound filaments
of light strike coal briquettes, a broom lurks.
On the left, a breathless empty stage,
unsettled dust, the roof’s raw underside.
We unwind our frayed washing rope.
The drying floor is warm like baking,
the rafters smell of vanilla, sweeter
where diamonds of sunlight magnify the grain.
The skylights are half-closed, the traffic hums
and drums. My mother has a far-away look.
I offer her pegs from a bowl.
There’s room up here to hang the bedding,
she straightens all the edges. I slink along
a corridor of sheets, not touching.
Regina Weinert lives in Sheffield. She has had a university career in language and linguistics. Her poems are also published by e.g. Magma, The North, Pennine Platform, Poetry Salzburg Review, Stand, Under the Radar and Wild Court.
Helen Finney
At my feet the window sprawls a view of kneaded land,
craggy baked by the hand of the gods, dusted green
with short bit grass.
Eugene O’Hare
It hasn’t been this bright all year –
the moon’s white scalp, spot-lit,
a head turned away from a thing
the rest of us fear: unearthly dark
Juliet Humphreys
Though I am not a painter
this is to be a portrait
of my parents and my sister.
Julian Dobson
You too I guess
have studied the surviving starlings
as they swoop and whistle
by the snack trailer at Moorfoot
Mark Czanik
I loved the tales Luke told me of starving writers,
and the sacrifices they made following their hearts.
Philip K Dick eating dog food. Bukowski’s candy bars.
Nigel King
My compass – its needle set with a sliver of blue stone – spins and spins. Breath mists my snow
goggles. I wipe them endlessly. Even in these thick seal-skin mitts my hands are frozen. I have been
no place as still as this.
Clare Bryden
seek justice
and you hold
a seashell to your ear
hear
Gail Webb
He cuts. I lie still, teach myself
to dream of St David’s Bay,
seaweed strewn on incoming tides,
surfers slice big waves in half.
Kim Cullen
I pull a dress over my head
calm foggy blue linen
sleeved in lavender,
press frizzed hair