Barbara Thimm
Walking
across bridges, along railway tracks, mice zigzagging
my path, among pylons black with rain where bats move
raggedly. There were fires, distant, and sirens; later
I passed beneath scaffolds dripping with what
I don't know. At times my head rang
with phrases heard, once, phrases that stayed
like a mirror's frame left on the wall
years after it breaks. I have walked down long
flights of stairs, their banisters broken, their steps
defunct. I have leant against walls, too tired
to breathe. Exxon station islands, roads deserted
and green, I have seen
the night in this city, one night, all
nights, I have walked with soot in my hair, walked, soles
thinning, my mouth dry with concrete and fumes, walked while
cafés turned glaring and pale, seen lights dim, at last.
Returning I find
dawn staining my desk with dust.
Barbara Thimm lives and works in New York City. Her poems, reviews and essays have been published on stridemagazine.co.uk and in The Manhattan Review.
Page(s) 38
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