Today’s choice
Previous poems
Claire Lynn
Out of Place
I lie back, arch my throat,
pretend to relax. Contemplate
ceiling tiles, and women
who do this weekly
for pleasure. A basin
strangles me. The palm
of a hand realigns my head: this
is how the ironing board feels
when you dance with it.
I agree to a full fringe
because I can’t identify
the part of the question
I don’t understand. Christmas
seems to come round faster
each year. My small talk
shrinks. I spray
DON’T SPEAK TO ME
across my reflection.
I’d like to foreclose, cut
the blow dry, but am helpless
as a mermaid; surrender
to hot brush and serum.
Release lifts my hair
like the tail of a kite. I run
all the way home.
Claire Lynn was shortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best Single Poem in 2025. She won the Tyne and Wear Metro Poetry Prize in 2023, and has been published in magazines such as Butcher’s Dog, Pennine Platform and Alchemy Spoon.
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.
Claire Miller
rose is thirsty
rose senses water
rose root rummages in the earth
rose root punctures lung and frontal lobe
rose stem is a green straw sucking
Sylvia Banham
Pigeons have invaded the garden, two then four, then a flock.
They roost in the apple tree to nest, reconnoitre or mate
ignore my sorties to deter them and shit without stint
on patio and herb bed, foul lovely hyssop and thyme.