Ian Brook
The Systems
Somewhere, somewhere close tonight there is rain.
We sense it. The landscape inflates and the swallows
Gather on silent wires. They are bunched,
Dark, darker than we remember them
From this time last year, or indeed
From any time of any year. The systems are down.
Communication begins, only to undo itself
Like an unfinished sentence.
If there is solace to be found tonight
We find it, used as we are to living this way,
Quietly, even quieter now, in the absence
Of friend or dog or woman;
Safe here, our terrors
Left like years to accumulate around us.
Outside, only the irreversible logic
Of dirt and traffic.
The systems, they assure us,
Will soon be put in place again.
We know they will not last but will continue
To fracture now with increasing regularity.
A broken clock. A busted heart.
The sleep from which we wake
To worsening news and the real journey
Yet to be embarked upon.
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