Today’s choice
Previous poems
Samarth Agarwal
Object M16- The Pillars of Creation
He who created all things, and bears up the pillars of creation, hath now become so weak, that He must be carried by a woman! – Charles Spurgeon
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Here — in the absolute zero of space — fireworks!
Look how the crucibles of creation,
those million coloured fingers that stretch light years —
force fusion, squeeze hydrogen, become
furnaces of light birthing suns.
Yes, they birth suns — which means they are dying.
With each new star the pillars suffer:
erosion, cremation, photoevaporation.
All creation has a sacrifice.
All creation has a birth.
*
All creation has a Mother.
*
Why am I remembering now the star-empty nights?
When — having crossed the event horizon of my mind,
I would run to you.
You would take me close, lie down by my bedside,
like stars strewn across midnight’s floor,
lit only by the mosquito light’s red dwarf glow.
I would wake the next day, your only trace
the gentle warmth in my hands,
slowly cooling into the universe.
Sue Proffitt
You and I have had many talks since you died.
Nick Cooke
If when you go to the barber today
He asks if you’d like him to ‘tidy up your ears’,
Think of all the wildest sprawling vegetation
That will never be tidied, or trimmed, by clippers or shears,
Edward Alport
High up, out of reach,
on a branch, no, more a twig,
a little wizened, shrunken face leers down.
Colin Pink
not the kind you eat with
but useful to turn the soil
root out potatoes or carrots
Linda Ford
My Father Bought a Signal Box
dismantled it piece by piece
then sold the wood, as a job lot.
Ryan O’Neill
we hug and i act cool
as the american fridge ice
shattering on kitchen tiles
David Thompson
Scrolling through my inbox I hold down
the shift key, select all and mass delete
briefly feel the repose of the therapist’s couch.
Marcelle Newbold
Hope lies like the edge of a teaspoon, upward facing, a thickness
perhaps enough solidness to knife
through a banana or other soft fruit
Britta Giersche
a wooden door slams shut in my brain
a man perishes in a space the size of his grave from malnutrition eighty years ago