You Know
It seems the usual story.
Someone you would never expect to meet again
tells you their all.
It doesn't matter where:
in a conference bar,
a train journey,
cross-channel ferry,
waiting for the youngest's health check.
You show an interest
without really listening.
Phrases dodge past sliding doors:
the job's too much,
he never understands,
she doesn't care,
they're all bastards.
Dull steel squashes the rest.
You have enough to go on;
to hear what they have to say
in order to leave well alone.
They stop.
You see,
they expect you to say something:
anything really, just to help,
to make a bit of a difference.
You do not know what to say.
But just as you are about to speak,
they disappear
as though they never existed.
You look around, of course.
No one else seems to have noticed.
They're still busy.
Then you realise
you have been staring
into a mirror.
Page(s) 10-11
magazine list
- Features
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- 10th Muse
- 14
- Acumen
- Agenda
- Ambit
- Angel Exhaust
- ARTEMISpoetry
- Atlas
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- 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