Today’s choice
Previous poems
Annabelle Markwick-Staff
Olympics
I devoured the Olympics, filled my mouth
and scrapbook with sticky ephemera.
I stalked a torch, seized my shining,
perforated prey, and stared into the void
of Wenlock and Mandeville’s eyes.
Sometimes, I am in the Olympics. I crawl
from my bed to my desk, and I sweat for gold.
I clutch my bottle of Lucozade
Sport Fruit Punch – Apple vs Raspberry,
my knuckles stark beneath desiccated skin.
I suckle Isotonic hydration from pink plastic,
electrolytes and athlete images fuel
my endurance, my metaphysical marathon.
Yes, Anthony Joshua, I will Stay Humble –
from Gallions Reach to Avalon,
I have many hills to spiral, many petals to burn.
Annabelle Markwick-Staff graduated with an MA in Writing Poetry from the Poetry School/ Newcastle University. Her poems are published in Popshot, Kindred Spirit, London Grip, Sage Cigarettes and Black Bough Poetry Christmas-Winter Anthology Volume 4. She is annabelleocto on Instagram.
Annie Kissack
No place to put a man
and hope he’ll stay together.
The sensible nouns are already exiting the side door.
Rachel Curzon
There is as much darkness
as she wished for. As much moon.
Abu Ibrahim
When young boys go missing,
the neighbourhood rallies a search party.
We panic like a bomb’s ticking
Debs Buchan
Tish was always coming home
home with its broken bricks and scrap fires
always the smell of something burning
Rebecca Brown
She’s grateful to be alive with these tumours crackling in her bones
Alan McGuire
Going downtown was pre-drinking, save money, buy confidence.
Going downtown was queuing outside Walkabout, a drunken reality show.
Going downtown wasn’t a release, but a rite of passage.
Ryan O’Neill
Where can we go on holidays this year,and when will we get a house if you’re away for two years,and now you’re crying,and it’s £4 to park for the day . . .
Anna Vercambre
Shall we build you out of cardboard? Shall we build you out of tin cans?
Sue Johns
To keep an engine thrumming,
to perform the perfect cleft
how much strength, how many attempts?