Category: Poetry
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Review of Nathan Shepherdson’s “Sweeping the Light Back Into the Mirror”
[A shorter version of this article was first published under the titled “A stretched agony” in Catalonia Today magazine, June 2016.] small children trade the world for distraction deal in statements with the grammar of a road sign they’re happy to put the sun in the top corner of the page count backwards from 9…
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What Have We?
[An extract of this poem was first published in Catalonia Today magazine, December 2014.] There’s the vacant look of history’s books Slave labour and murder thy neighbour Innocents torture and screw your own daughter This is the past we still have We see human remains and bullet-trains Product wars and useless laws Greed…
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Carnal mud
spring in winter and free wine today it was as if somewhere a switch was flicked hungry but don’t want to eat only bitterness can be wrung from the cold (but disaster is only a muscle twitch away) is there a word for that sensation of "this happy moment cannot last"…
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Becoming our father
[Photo by Javier Beraluce] (Written for and inspired by Matt) Yes, I am now attracted to the mute certainty Of arms as oars The sunstroke back too and the smell of Bruts When you stammered for the right words you found (when every little nail starts to grow inwards and every little injustice is anticipated)…
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Singular
fold tomorrows rain and under the loose world night play blind on young ground ………… one earth full of single stars blown here by unrelenting years those seas of sorrows know written in liars lines saying come and become the past full like her darkest pity to show such thought is mine ………. might I…
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Outside
The medieval bells sound The church light angles in Across our lowly bed But come what sorrow can This confounded appetite Will count its own worth And feed from troughs of minutes
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The Finding of History
[For Jessie Starkey] As a child There was no such thing as history Nothing in our town had patina, texture, age Nothing showed evidence of time long ago The lines were straight The streets were new The houses breathed fresh air only And their bricks were made recently All this was obvious…
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The Only Way Is…
[For secondary school students] When you become a kid You’re always looking UP At grown-UPs And some of them think you should… Keep UP with the others Stand UP when yer told to Live UP to expectations And always turn UP on time Eat UP all that dinner Drink UP all…
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June Haiku
[Photo: Pedro Duarte] [England, 2006] Sitting in the dark A crack in every window Ants investigate …….. Against my own will Hours spent with petty minds And their dirty mouths ……… No feelings or words People tend flowers under That strange lamp the sun …….. Mouth wide…
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Death Notices
[First published in “Love and Fear: A Poetry Anthology,” 2003.] she died even the ambulance was ambivalent a baby died lying still on its back they thought about their income tax 1000 died spiraling down in a plane his world remained exactly the same a fly dies legs kicking in the air…
Brett Hetherington 