Steven Hastings
Ian's Dad
Struck me
as a man who understood the intricacies of mortality.
Well you've got to die of something he'd say
as he tipped sugar straight from the bowl into his tea
so no-one could tell how many spoonfuls he
was having. You knew it was a lot though because
the tea would rise right up over the lip of the cup.
Whenever he said that, about having to die of something,
he always got the same reply from Ian's mum:
Yes, and in your case it'll be a bloody heart attack.
I liked his dad: once he took the fatty
bits from off my chop when no-one was looking.
That was years ago when I was just a kid, but then
last year he did die and, yes, it was a heart attack
and Ian's mum spent the funeral telling everyone
how she'd told him, time and again she'd told him,
but he wouldn't listen
And why should he have, love her brother said
You're a hairdresser not a bloody dietician.
She laughed. He said it nice not nasty.
Page(s) 41
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