Today’s choice
Previous poems
David Thompson
I no longer prioritise, I choose who to disappoint that day
I’m a cardboard loo roll with one sheet left
wet grounds scraped from the coffee pot
a biro tip scratching at paper in circles.
Scrolling through my inbox I hold down
the shift key, select all and mass delete
briefly feel the repose of the therapist’s couch.
If it was important, they’ll chase me.
Working from home means
I can hear my son growing up without me.
Like an ex-lover texting again
saying they need to process
there is another survey asking
do you have confidence in the management?
They never offer a free vote.
Business is autocracy; this is what we vote for
like eating the last stale biscuits because
they are there, and takeaway takes longer.
Such things squeeze my love
leave it to be sifted through each evening
with the daily leftovers.
David Thompson is a poet from Droitwich Spa, Worcestershire. His work has been published in magazines and anthologies, most recently by Acumen, Broken Sleep Books and The Interpreter’s House.
Aidan Semmens
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Gail Webb
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We give a throwaway kiss
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We plant the seed with hope
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Valentine Jones
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Amanda Coleman White
I sit in quiet daylight
wondering if I should pray,
hearing mother cardinals echoing
my laments, an aural mirage
mutates into children crying
as a teacher hushes them into a corner,
quiet mice now…
Kelli Lage
Dead of Winter
If my inner child is kidnapped,
I’ll freeze my nightmares to that ole pole.
I don’t know how to use a lighter
is what I’d say if asked.
Shamik Banerjee
A Rumination
With ginger chai, lounged in the balcony,
Revisiting the years she and her spouse
Endeavoured for a better, self-owned house,
She takes a breath of content, finally.
Benedicta Norell
Questions
We were always in the car that year the price of having a nice house in a nice area get in get
in it’s time to go where are we going our friends the supermarket the cinema the mall just for
a drive between banks of jaded shovelled snow
Kathy Pimlott
It’s impossible to foretell what will provoke tears, the sort
that well up and tip over while you hold onto the kitchen sink
waiting for them to subside…
Ali Murphy
Mean sister We are stuck in our own words, not hearing each other. Sixty-somethings, we may as well be six, throwing sticks down the beck or poking dolls eyes out of their sockets, scribbling on their perfect faces. We are well rehearsed, know our cues,...