Poetry

It goes on one at a time,
it starts when you care to act,
it starts when you do it again after they said no,
it starts when you say we and know who you mean,
and each day you mean one more.

Marge Piercy

Wednesday, 08 May 2019 09:48

helpston

Written by Fran Lock

in Poetry

helpston by Fran Lock the brazen head has spoken: heat. and now, the summerlifts its loaded pitchforks to the light. the pewit in the dog-whistle of its wings. gardens teem, lecherous and stifled.here, the sly, fermented smiles of youth on bikes. they donot know. this heat, a tight green crouch…

John Clare

Monday, 06 May 2019 18:08

On the birth of Prince What's-His-Name

Written by Kevin Higgins

in Poetry

On The Birth Of Prince What’s-His-Namebefore Carol Ann Duffy by Kevin Higgins Receive this boy-child, world, to pursue him about the pages of the tabloids and glossies that were his granny’s premature end.Under the sign of the Express,and Nicholas Witchell of the BBC, we conspirefor him a life of turning…

royal birth

Thursday, 02 May 2019 14:45

Mayday poem: The Company Board

Written by Chris Norris

in Poetry

The Company Board by Chris Norris The propertied class and the class of the proletariat present the same human self-estrangement. But the former class feels at ease and strengthened in this self-estrangement, it recognizes estrangement as its own power, and has in it the semblance of a human existence. The…

K2_PUBLISHED_ON Thursday, 02 May 2019 12:47

Mayday poem: The Blacklist

in Poetry

Written by Owen Gallagher

The Blacklist by Owen Gallagher Everyone sped off at the end of their shift.No one saw him sobbing in his car.No one paused to say he deserved a starfor speaking out; that his courage was a gift. He feared his wife’s reaction to the news,he’d been sacked instantly without pay,and…

K2_PUBLISHED_ON Wednesday, 01 May 2019 14:47

Mobilise the books! A review of Shabbigentile

in Poetry

Written by Andy Croft

Andy Croft reviews Shabbigentile, by Alan Morrison. There is a long poem in Alan Morrison’s fantastic new collection Shabbigentile (Culture Matters, £9, available here) about the 1930s Left Book Club, invoking the idea of ‘red belles-lettres ringing red bells / Of rebellion’: ‘Now once more books need to be mobilised…

K2_PUBLISHED_ON Wednesday, 01 May 2019 14:07

Mayday poem: hearts bigger than the sun

in Poetry

Written by Martin Hayes

hearts bigger than the sun by Martin Hayes Chaplin had itKeaton had itand Laurel and Hardy had it Lucas has itas he walks in early for workwith a flask and Tupperware box full of sandwiches under his armwith ‘mornings’ and ‘alright mates’spilling out of him like birdsongbefore he sits down…

K2_PUBLISHED_ON Saturday, 20 April 2019 21:01

Saint Martin in Euston

in Poetry

Written by Fran Lock

Saint Martin in Euston by Fran Lock miserere. monday is a man reduced to his bare incident, a stain the pavement eats. a sharded light is stalled between the concrete benches, busses, cranes. drills compete, declare a complex discord. everywhere the air is rutted, hurts. and yet the earth turns…

Thursday, 18 April 2019 15:35

where once there was grass

Written by Martin Hayes

in Poetry

where once there was grass by Martin Hayes the yellow and green of the ambulanceused to be all whitewith just one single blue lighton the top of it the boys used to swedge a little in the parksfisticuffs and a boot in the gutsnot saying that’s rightbut at least they…

Thursday, 14 March 2019 14:46

Butcher's Dozen: Bloody Sunday, 47 years on

Written by Jenny Farrell

in Poetry

Jenny Farrell protests the decision only to charge one paratrooper, and introduces extracts from Thomas Kinsella's poem, Butcher's Dozen Shock and disbelief is the reaction of most people in Ireland to the decision of the N. Ireland Prosecution Service (NIPP) only to charge one British paratrooper, “Soldier F” in connection…

Wednesday, 13 March 2019 11:18

Shabbigentile: a radical challenge to poetry, politics and economics

Written by Dave Russell

in Poetry

Dave Russell reviews Alan Morrison's latest collection, Shabbigentile. With this book I feel that I am confronted by a category-breaker – a work that bridges the gulf between the passion of poetry and outrage, and the analytical precision of a major historian and political theorist. I have always associated the…