Today’s choice
Previous poems
Kate Vanhinsbergh
We Should Probably Get Up Now
but, outside, the world has paused:
the wind has put down its loneliness,
its fear of never being seen, or known,
and next door’s kids have stopped screaming
through the wall. The cats are curled up
around our ankles, and you say you like me
like this, with the sun falling in slabs
through the window, onto my hair,
my curls glowing orange on the pillow.
You touch my cheek
with the backs of your fingers.
In this room, we have nothing but time –
glasses of water; a vase of white roses;
miles of cotton drawn up and spun
from the earth. I could have believed
that all chances, all paths crossed
were love’s quiet design,
the architecture of its concussive maze.
Kate Vanhinsbergh is a poet from Manchester, UK, and can be found on Instagram @kate.vanhinsbergh or X @katevanbergh
Amirah Al Wassif
The God I know works as a baker in a local shop.
From time to time, I see him feeding the kittens bread crumbs soaked in milk.
Cliff McNish
Heaven For starters, the standard works everyone gets: three trumpets blown in unison; your name acclaimed to the galactic hegemony of stars; plus assorted angels with ceramically smooth hands (the nail-work!) casting wholesale quantities of petals (flowers of the...
Paul Stephenson
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Holly Winter-Hughes
You stand behind me / catch my eye / take the snatch of silver
Laura McKee
after the accident the plaster
held her still
Melanie Branton
At boarding school, I had no idea what to do
with myself. Most of the time,
I hid myself in a paper bag . . .
Lucy Calder
I arrange my books in order of height,
on a bank of cow parsley,
amid the random oscillations
of a cool breeze
Tanya Joseph
I know others blossom
but I vomit ectoplasm,
and squaring the corners of my bed,
the nurse reminds me I’m not dying.
Lucy Heuschen
It is known: a woman like that
brings evil on board.