Chris Preddle
Xmas
That Renaissance image
is born unto us this day: obese albino baby Jesus,
seal pup, pupa, grub
in a crib,
ego
on its way to metamorphosis into divine imago:
image from altarpieces
by the Master of the Madonna with the Cockroach.
Wallpaper carols are playing
in the Co-op,
scored like the Old Groaner’s torch songs. O, Tannenbaum
has a tune the same
as The Red Flag. That red flag in miniature
that I bought in Moscow from a disillusioned soldier
in pinned up
above our stairs. We try to keep it flying.
I watch you dabbing an itchy ear
with hydrocortisone. We’ve celebrated
a western Xmas
much as we’re obliged to scratch our eczemas.
I have no image for the season
except you – a small Celtic person,
white-eared, red-
headed in two senses, loving and most dear.
Page(s) 52
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