The Postcard on the Fridge
for Erren
He hadn’t seen the postcard
friend for months, had skimmed
the message, seen it came
from a gallery of art and artefacts
which merged now with thoughts of
dropping fragile things, of throwing
fresh eggs over a house one summer,
he and his sisters, before this,
the strange marriage, and her dropping
herself after days of migraine,
it couldn’t last forever he’d said,
see a doctor For God’s sake,
kept saying it now, For God’s sake,
wondering how it had sounded to her,
to see if she’d taken instructions
from him, to pitch herself out
from the sixth storey window,
all broken, all possibilities,
of children, their married life.
But face and spine intact, they said,
except her jaw. The best possible
outcome under the circumstances
For God’s sake God’s sake.
He dealt and re-dealt all
the available evidence, migraine,
their few final conversations
For God’s sake For God’s
and the postcard with the deer’s
haunch, the buff colour of women’s skin,
its long model legs, and their long last
journey when the guard announced
we are delayed because of lads
running on the line, exposing
themselves to danger. Had she
thought that through, those boys,
and here on the fridge, the hind,
trussed birds, feathers up like wind-blown
skirts, a watching man in the shadows,
and a single line of warning,
Dead Game with Male Figure.
Page(s) 10
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- Interpreter's House, The
- Iota
- Journal, The
- Lamport Court
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- Magma
- Matchbox
- Matter
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- North, The
- Oasis
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- Paper, The
- Pen Pusher Magazine
- Poetry Cornwall
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- Poetry London (1951)
- Poetry Nation
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- Poetry Salzburg Review
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- Private Tutor
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- Review, The
- Rialto, The
- Second Aeon
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- Shearsman
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- Staple
- Strange Faeces
- Tabla Book of New Verse, The
- Thumbscrew
- Tolling Elves
- Ugly Tree, The
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- Yellow Crane, The