Today’s choice
Previous poems
Kay Feneley
Office Workers Against Sewage
Some days I must immerse myself in the waters
These days are more than others
Monday 09.06 – a sewage overflow has activated
Some days on the shore silence as we change
snuggle mugs, pass biscuits around
Tuesday 15.01- a sewage overflow has activated
Some days the choppiness is fun
we bounce along together
Wednesday 11:17 – a sewage overflow has activated
These days should make me buoyant
give purpose, community, bread
Thursday 17.47 – a sewage overflow has activated
Some days the mist disguises, I float
undisturbed by particulates of shit
Friday 12:52 – a sewage overflow has activated
Some days the smell lingers, stomach turns
mid-morning start to shiver
Sunday 23.59 – a sewage overflow has activated
Some days I dread going in
These days are more than others
Kay Feneley lives and writes in London, mostly as a civil servant but also poetry making sense of life as a disabled, neurodiverse woman. She was shortlisted in the Bridport Poetry Prize and publication includes Black Iris and Wildfire Words.
On the Ninth Day of Christmas we bring you Mark Connors, Michelle Diaz, Sue Finch
Today I am in church again. I have come for silent reflection in one of my favourite seats, but it feels a little closer to the edge than usual.
On the First Day of Christmas we bring you Sarah Mnatzaganian, Rebecca Gethin, Jenni Thorne
Towards the Solstice
owls fly closer in December twilight,
call to each other across the garden.
Martin Fisher
Inside, in the half-light, the iron rot took hold.
Forgotten service–obsolete.
Salt-coin neglect.
The money flowed inland,
Moored on an hourglass choke.
No one told the sea.
Craig Dobson
Out of morning
a misted light,
glowing fire
in the air.
Steven Taylor
A very long time ago
Stephen Fry’s godfather, the
Justice, Sir Oliver Popplewell
Who chaired the inquiry
Into the Bradford City
Amirah Al Wassif
Beneath my armpit lives a Sinbad the size of a thumb.
His imagination feeds through an umbilical cord tied to my womb.
Now and then, people hear him speaking through a giant microphone—
Singing,
Cracking jokes,
Mark Smith
In the portacabin that morning, men smoked
and looked at last week’s paper again.
There was no water to fill the urn.
The first job – to get connected
Toby Cotton
A blustery day –
the wind too strong for kites
or for lifts to the sky.
“To a thoughtful spot,” it cites
and pins me to the earth.
Ansuya Patel
except this burnt red vase.
Hand shaped in the muffled roar,
devouring flame in the furnace’s mouth.