Today’s choice
Previous poems
Anna Bowles
Akademichna Street
is bombed-out flats, is
the hot-pink Sweet Bakery Café, is
straggly new-planted trees, is
infantry quaffing cappuccino, is
the community hub spilling ragged donations, is
fuchsia velvet armchairs, is
the balcony with the twitching flag, is
another glide bomb on course for the city, is
partly still standing so fuck you russia, is
the medic checking her eyeliner over cheesecake, is
the café owner smoking on the steps, her
eyes averted from her bombed-out flat
Anna Bowles is a freelance editor and activist who divides her time between London and East Ukraine. Her work is deeply rooted in personal experience. Her first pamphlet, Landscape With Mines, was published by Mica Press in 2025.
She is currently near the front working with groups of local volunteer evacuators and IDP support hubs, trying to draw as much attention as possible to their cause. More here: https://annabowles.substack.com/
For updates from Anna follow her on
@annabowles.bsky.social
Facebook: anna.bowles.90
Instagram: annabowleswriter
You can supportive the work of Anna and those working with her by donating to Aid Ukraine UK which is UK registered but all the money they receive goes to Druzi Space, a Ukrainian team conducting evacuations and refugee support on the ground in Donetsk Oblast.
David Bernard
I wrote the title of the lesson on the board and underlined it with a flourish. The class listened to my introduction.
Colin Pink
I used to ‘see’ you when you were alive,
I mean when you weren’t there. I carry you
around like a photo in a wallet.
Lottie McCrindell
All summer the sun scorched the city
and the sky held back its tears.
Roz Doe
The night before,
I paced London’s streets
sparkling and fizzing with ideas
the pills used to dull and destroy.
I felt awake, alive.
Iris Anne Lewis
And so I went into the owl.
Eyes, green as moss,
darken to black. Oak tassels
spell-woven to feathers.
Nairn Kennedy
You notice the nose: webbed veins spritzed
with little flicks of red, purple blotches
daubed with a palette-knife, broken ends
where blood-vessels gave up the ghost.
Jason Ryberg
Still Life of Fish and Bird
Mark McDonnell
Fascinated by the priest’s teeth I don’t realise
I’m kicking the pew in front with a restless foot
until someone taps me sharply on the knee.
James Mason
In Italian I have no inner life.
With no past or future tense
My needs are immediate.