Today’s choice
Previous poems
Claire Booker
Dehydration
Never has there been so much interest
in the humble tongue. It peek-a-boos from my mouth
like the little man in a weather clock.
The consultant’s quick look predicts storms in its fur.
She keeps pouring water into my glass as fast
as I can gulp it down – more, yes, more –
working the jug with her right hand, taking my pulse
with the left, eyes fixed on my SpO2 levels.
What couldn’t she do with three arms?
Claire Booker‘s poetry has appeared in Agenda, Dark Horse, Magma and Stand, among others. She won The Poetry Society’s 2023 Stanza Competition, and was longlisted in the 2023 National Poetry Competition. Her collection, A Pocketful of Chalk is out with Arachne Press. Her pamphlet, The Bone That Sang, is with Indigo Dreams.
Becky Cherriman
What does it wake me to
as sky is hearthed by morning
and my home warms slow?
Mark Carson
he dithers round the kitchen, lifts his 12-string from her hook,
strikes a ringing rasgueado, the echo bouncing back
emphatic from the slate flags and off the marble table.
Elizabeth Worthen
This is how (I like to think) it begins:
night-time, August, the Devon cottage, where
the darkness is so complete . . .
Elly Katz
When naked with myself, I feel where a right elbow isn’t, then is. I let my left palm guide me through the exhibition of my body.
Laurence Morris
The night of his arrest I climbed a hill
to find a deep cave in which to hide
Sarp Sozdinler
As a kid, Nehisi used to sleep in a treehouse. He could curl right into it from his bedroom window. He would have a hard time falling asleep every time his parents got loud or physical.
Three poems on Counting for National Poetry Day: Max Wallis, Julie Anne Jenson, Brian Kelly
I don’t wear them
or have any
but you gave me a pair
of seven-inch goth platform heels.
Fizza Abbas
They say change is a constant,
but this constant became a coefficient
always racing to catch me
Scott Elder
What will you do in winter dear when drifts
cover your fingers and shoes