Today’s choice
Previous poems
Chalice Am Bergris
The Insanity Ensemble
It is not like an egg cracking
or an exquisite shiver of shattered glass.
It is not a supercelery bone snap
or a wired ballerina bend.
A cortisol swoosh
floods your certainty
a prefrontal cortex throb
threatens thunder.
A neurotransmitter harpsichord
plucks delusions
the slide of an unconscious tear
as you slowly lose your mind.
Chalice Am Bergris is physically and mentally disabled. She has been published in Europe, Asia, Africa, America and Australia. She has won the the Over The Edge Poetry Prize in Ireland and is in the Best New British and Irish Poets anthology.
Seán Street
We lit a candle for you
that day in Sacre Coeur,
under its white-flame dome
as high as Paris could go
Marjory Woodfield
On Kinley’s Lane, quince tree, wild blackberries, branches of feijoa reaching over a fence, fallen fruit.
Ian Seed
What was the Welsh for ‘hedgehog’? That was what he wanted to know.
Sue Wallace-Shaddad
Rectangular, with corners cut off like an octagon, muddy brown shows through the cream exterior where the edges are chipped.
Cally Ann Kerr on International Transgender Day of Visibility
How many blows does it take to crack an egg?
Is a question I never expected to ask
If you don’t know, I should tell you, an egg
Is what they call the girl inside the male mask
Gita Ralleigh, Julian Matthews, Jackie Taylor on Colouring Outside the Lines
The hue of brides, appliquéd dark with henna.
Citron’s acid curl, vernal blades between teeth.
Sue Moules
I sell the postcard
of multi-coloured sheep
over and over again.
Kevin Denwood
Name called.
Not mine.
Wasn’t I
here first?
L Kiew
I leave everything on shingle,
meet surf like a sibling,
crest over playful breakers
and chase the moon’s tail.