Today’s choice

Previous poems

Matt Bryden

 

 

 

Lightly a god, if he wishes, can save a man, even from far off 

Now a blanket is spread, offerings
of chutney and shin bones, 

a taper held to the fire
that heats the tar beneath our boats.
 
A phial of bathwater discolours on a shelf,
unemptied since the day she was taken.

A pigeon in the role of catastrophist at the feast.
And Tiresias there, blindly 

reading auguries of birds 
from the mishmash of their sounds. 

 

Matt Bryden is a teacher and father living in Devon. His most recent publication is The Glassblower’s House (2023, Live Canon). He is Royal Literary Fellow at the University of Plymouth www.mattbrydenpoetry.co.uk

Francis de Lima

Oh London. U useless city. Map to

                                                                        nowhere land. Tight stretch 

                                                                        open eye. The underground metal. 

The night tube. The railway. Smog

Over coaltrip. The presence

                                                                          Of machine upon machine. U

Miriam Swales

When I was 12, I knew the weight of a human head.
8 Heads in a Duffel Bag (a bit of dark comedy).
It grew from there. The curiosity. The calculations.

Annie Kissack

      Girl Awaits the Psychic Investigators They’re late. The table is laid with a clean cloth, all normal and neat. Our visitors, city men, may find it hard to navigate the path but we can wait. They hope to gather evidence of a haunting; whether he’ll...