Today’s choice
Previous poems
Kate Hendry
Burning the Years
Lay down the worst ones –
raze them like swathes
of heather on the moor.
So what if there’s a dead patch.
Remember the havoc
unfettered fire makes –
flames twirl along the ridge,
tumble down the gorge.
Unbreathable heat and ash.
So burn those years
till there’s a dead plot of earth
and disaster’s spurned.
Behind you – safe beds of moss.
Ahead – untouched mounds
of rush like stepping stones.
Spin in the steam and smoke,
jump on the blackened years
sprung like a dance hall floor.
Kate Hendry‘s poems have been widely published in magazines, including PN Review, The Rialto and Poetry Wales. Her first pamphlet, The Lost Original, was published by Happenstance Press. Her second, MX SIMP (Mariscat Press) was shortlisted for the 2023 Michael Marks Awards.
Matt Bryden
at the cider farm, eight minutes
before handover, we strike on
feeding the donkeys –
Colin Pink
to embrace you is like clasping
a fist full of briars
Simon Williams
What were these fairies called
before we knew of hummingbirds?
Bumblebee moth because of the size?
Reed-nose moth because of the proboscis?
Elizabeth Barton
On Diamond Hill
I didn’t
think of you once
as I climbed
past stunted willows
straggles of gorse
Susan Jane Sims on Mothering Sunday
Matter cannot be created and it cannot be destroyed.
I think of this as I pour the almost white ash from
the green plastic container that came in the post
into the vibrant red metal urn I have ready.
Daniel Sluman
just as the night sky shifts
beyond the minds
of the animals outside
the ceilings
we are pressed beneath change
in aspect & colour
Farah Ali
Notes from nature on how to survive this:
1. Learn crypsis and mimesis be a gecko or a mossy frog
2. Method actors sway like dead-leaf mantises on branches
James Benger
We tore it all down
just to watch it burn,
standing in that alley
of forgotten refuse.
Graham Clifford
Check the cavities in you where hurt goes,
exactly the right shape to house an insult
like a power tool snug and clipped in its case.