Today’s choice
Previous poems
Rich Yates
The Bird
The bird
crept up on him, threw its voice into an empty tree,
he started to notice the aliveness of things,
wondered how
he had slept through his adult life
without ever having inhabited a bush.
The bird
followed him into a glade, revealed
certain important objects, a surging eyeball,
fully encased, a weapons-grade flask, army slacks
ideal for losing himself in,
he was rabid for the hunt.
The bird
was pleased with his progress, sent dispatches to other birds
on how he filled the air
with a librarian’s conceit,
recorded everything
in notebooks and photographs, a wayward inheritance.
To his family
it was nothing more than the latest hobby,
but quietly, assuredly, on those hot and cold days,
he learnt
how to hold the enemy in his crosshairs
and choose mercy.
Rich Yates is working on his first collection of poetry. His poems have so far appeared in Viper’s Tongue magazine. He is a proud Essex boy, works in conservation where he can enjoy the quiet beauty of the saltmarsh, and is a keen musician.
Chrissy Banks and Antony Owen (from the IS&T archives) for Holocaust Memorial Day
Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep Goodnight moon, goodnight stars, goodnight cherry, pear, apple tree. Goodnight pond, stop wriggling, newts, stop zipping the water, water-boatmen. Goodnight, glossy horses on the hill, rabbits in the field, white...
Clare Bryden
how do I begin?
Yvonne Baker
an etherial whiteness
that covers and disguises
as a strip of white frosted glass
Hilary Thompson
Ambling up North Street
on a Saturday afternoon
at the end of a long Winter,
I am stopped by two women
Irene Cunningham
Lavender seeps. I expect my limbs to leaden, lead the body down through sheet, mattress-cover, into the machinery of sleep where other lives exist.
Graham Clifford
The Still Face Experiment
You must have seen that Youtube clip
where a mother lets her face go dead.
Her toddler carries on burbling for twenty to thirty seconds until she realises there is nothing coming back to her.
Susan Jane Sims
After you died,
someone asked:
What was it like
in those final sixteen days
waiting for your son to die?
Jane Frank
I imagine returning to the house.
Furniture is piled up in the rain—
the ideas that won’t fit.
Ilias Tsagas
I used to dial your number to hear your voice. I would hold the receiver for a long time as if your voice was trapped inside . . .