The Polish Cleaning Lady
is upstairs, succouring the seedy English;
rubbing her duster over my books, eyeing
the titles. My Secret Life and The Cannabis
Experience are safely hidden.
I’ve put my letters in the desk, beneath
the Chilean gourd that could be a dildo.
But all this poetry, shelf on shelf,
has already told against me.
Cleaning the window, she watches
the tits and sparrows and starlings
packing their gizzards with Wildbird Mix.
It is spring. Not now give this birds.
Each must find alone!
This is mistake you make.
Her blonde free-enterprise brow
is dark with disapproval.
She ponders, while slowly wiping:
In your room is picture of Rasputin.
Is he your guru? I smile and deny it.
It’s quite clear to her that I am lying.
Page(s) 44
magazine list
- Features
- zines
- 10th Muse
- 14
- Acumen
- Agenda
- Ambit
- Angel Exhaust
- ARTEMISpoetry
- Atlas
- Blithe Spirit
- Borderlines
- Brando's hat
- Brittle Star
- Candelabrum
- Cannon's Mouth, The
- Chroma
- Coffee House, The
- Dream Catcher
- Equinox
- Erbacce
- Fabric
- Fire
- Floating Bear, The
- French Literary Review, The
- Frogmore Papers, The
- Global Tapestry
- Grosseteste Review
- Homeless Diamonds
- Interpreter's House, The
- Iota
- Journal, The
- Lamport Court
- London Magazine, The
- Magma
- Matchbox
- Matter
- Modern Poetry in Translation
- Monkey Kettle
- Moodswing
- Neon Highway
- New Welsh Review
- North, The
- Oasis
- Obsessed with pipework
- Orbis
- Oxford Poetry
- Painted, spoken
- Paper, The
- Pen Pusher Magazine
- Poetry Cornwall
- Poetry London
- Poetry London (1951)
- Poetry Nation
- Poetry Review, The
- Poetry Salzburg Review
- Poetry Scotland
- Poetry Wales
- Private Tutor
- Purple Patch
- Quarto
- Rain Dog
- 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