John West
Dragon
I trap people to ransack them for stories
corners are handy, bus stops
station platforms; I might ask
When is the next train due, or, Isn't the weather rotten
but then it is winter, I like the cold but it gets boring
after a month or two, or perhaps I'll bring up Russia or
in the saddlery shop, buying a pair of gloves
I'll ask whether horses and cows feel the cold
and the woman will tell me about her massive black gelding
standing in the rain one night with his teeth actually chattering
or I'll ask the guy from the kitchen at work
about boxing and crowd control; or, being a "bouncer"
190 centimetres, 116 kilos, shoulders like cliffs, hands the size
of garden rakes. Yes, he boxed, I think he says "30"
his voice is gravelly from Bosnia
and from the body that lies suspended below his mouth
and yes, he's controlled some crowds
he grins slowly but will confess to nothing more
except his name and vital stats. When I meet him now
before seven in the morning
pushing the metallic snake of trolleys
stacked with food or rubbish trays
into or out of a lift
I'll no longer need to merely nod or wave
I know him, or the parts he wants me to
and I can call him "Dragon"
although that may not be how it's spelt
Page(s) 13
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- 10th Muse
- 14
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- Cannon's Mouth, The
- Chroma
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- French Literary Review, The
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- Iota
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- Lamport Court
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- Magma
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- Matter
- Modern Poetry in Translation
- Monkey Kettle
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- North, The
- Oasis
- Obsessed with pipework
- Orbis
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- Painted, spoken
- Paper, The
- Pen Pusher Magazine
- Poetry Cornwall
- Poetry London
- Poetry London (1951)
- Poetry Nation
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- Poetry Salzburg Review
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- Private Tutor
- Purple Patch
- Quarto
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- Reach Poetry
- Review, The
- Rialto, The
- Second Aeon
- Seventh Quarry, The
- Shearsman
- Smiths Knoll
- Smoke
- South
- Staple
- Strange Faeces
- Tabla Book of New Verse, The
- Thumbscrew
- Tolling Elves
- Ugly Tree, The
- Weyfarers
- Wolf, The
- Yellow Crane, The