Today’s choice
Previous poems
Mike Duggan
The Stirrups Of Genghis Khan
A decapitated road sign
Spears the yellow verge,
Meaningless as a symbol
Of progress. A vain strut.
The bus driver’s hands are folded
As the stop approaches.
From the fields,
An algorithm of hooves enters the ears
Of yawning school children.
More is known than ever before.
The day doubles over, winded
And as language must
Death moves
A little off, as if uncertain.
Mike Duggan is a fifty year old poet from London. His work has appeared over time in The Rialto, Magma, Tears In The Fence and Perverse. He has a new poem forthcoming in The Rialto 104 and his pamphlet Masquerade was recently shortlisted by the Dithering Chaps press.
Robin Lindsay Wilson
The single crimson rose
she wears in her lapel,
to test his imperfections,
draws him into detail
Ian Hickey
When the half-light drops below the horizon
the birth of darkness comes
Rose Lennard
My mother died seven years ago, but last night
she had a message for me. The mechanics
are irrelevant, what she gave stays with me
Rongili Biswas
Girls under the tree,
one with hands clasped as in worship,
the others picking
the scarlet fallen seeds
Laura Sheahen
What is the ancient curse they know that you don’t
Moving along their mouth-lines and their eyebrows
Lowering their lids, tensing their nods or shrugs
Marilyn Ricci
After his baby son died he strapped
a tumble dryer to his back and ran
the roads around the village.
Wendy Clayton
I’m always thinking about how I can find more human beings.
Kate Leah Hewett
Sorry, but I’ve stopped
cleaning the windows.
Winifred Mok
Perhaps it’s because
I look like
I’m just passing through