Today’s choice
Previous poems
Katherine Duffy
Wake
(Leaving Amorgos, Greece)
The ferry pushes the sea,
forces a long, white reply
that speaks of where we’ve been –
a hulk of rock, a prison
in the time of the Colonels,
now a place of painted chairs,
fairy lights. I lean over,
try to read the disarranged water,
the sea in dark mode.
I count the times we’ve
come and gone. More
behind us now than before.
We sail on, past other islands
brothers gently sleeping.
The white scroll
reaches back,
undoes itself.
Katherine Duffy lives in Dublin. Her poems have appeared in many publications, including Poetry Ireland Review, Crannóg, The Interpreter’s House, etc. She has published collections with The Dedalus Press (Ireland) and in 2018 a pamphlet with Templar Poetry.
John Coburn
Inside May’s warm beauty
I think of God and of the Virgin Mary.
I’ve always loved Mary.
Joe Wright
three sheep and a sharp wind, behind
which I feel involvement start
to tug.
Clara-Læïla Laudette
I’m six days late
and this is known as a
delinquent period.
Jan Swann
You seem very far from home
and who would after all choose a grit pocked
pavement to languish on
Gwen Sayers
Clouds spit on the coffin,
wring oily rags, splash
a woman, her violin
cased in sunken purple.
Dave Wynne-Jones
And did she break your heart?
A woman asks, perhaps imagining
A fallen chalice . . .
Simon Maddrell
Four years in Knockaloe was a living
inspiration for inventor Joseph Pilates.
Tom Kelly
At thirteen I am competing with James Joyce,
encouraging pain, at the very least discomfort.
Nick McGaughey
And here you are slid from the rain
under my door, “s” -ing along the cool
checks in the hallway.