The Latecomers
for Britta Olinder
One week late for Helena Hallqvist’s ninetieth birthday,
We see her for the first time in the gamla kyrka.
Sitting at right angles to us, she gazes ahead
At the pulpit and the candles the sun doesn’t put out.
She looks up at the ceiling built like a hull, at Christ
Straddling a rainbow that fades into the woodwork.
From just in front of her earlobe three dainty wrinkles
Ripple outwards as crinkles at her daughter’s ear.
‘The kingdom of heaven is like this,’ the pastor begins.
We are the latecomers in his sermon, the labourers
Hired at the eleventh hour and paid an equal wage
To those who bore ‘the burden and heat of the day’.
We are not too late for her birthday, who have sweated
For only one hour in the vineyard and earned our penny.
Page(s) 14
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