Ask how she is
Say: How is it with you? Expect her
to sigh, to shift, to stir.
A match (unlit)
falls to the floor. It lands
poised between boards. With another
she prises it out.
In the small of her back
a vertebra
clicks into place; shoulders
melt fractionally,
as imperceptible
as a snowflake’s demise. She is focused
on the gladioli;
a tall /stark /rigid stem, rooted
where it ought not. Cannot. No sooner that
than the memory of last night’s
sudden windfall –a wad of notes
in a pocket –her pocket? and
who was it trying to take it from her?
Sigh. All those birds, so
perfect up there.
Significance? Lost
in an avalanche
–graphic, speedy,
incomplete,
taking with it…
to sigh, to shift, to stir.
A match (unlit)
falls to the floor. It lands
poised between boards. With another
she prises it out.
In the small of her back
a vertebra
clicks into place; shoulders
melt fractionally,
as imperceptible
as a snowflake’s demise. She is focused
on the gladioli;
a tall /stark /rigid stem, rooted
where it ought not. Cannot. No sooner that
than the memory of last night’s
sudden windfall –a wad of notes
in a pocket –her pocket? and
who was it trying to take it from her?
Sigh. All those birds, so
perfect up there.
Significance? Lost
in an avalanche
–graphic, speedy,
incomplete,
taking with it…
Linda Black studied at Leeds College of Art and the Slade. Her
poems have appeared in several magazines and in the Poetry
School anthology Entering the Tapestry (Enitharmon).
poems have appeared in several magazines and in the Poetry
School anthology Entering the Tapestry (Enitharmon).
Page(s) 76
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