Two poems, by Stephen Brockwell

 

Lost Tongues
for Pearl Pirie

It was as if our tongues
escaped the compound
and ran off by themselves
to the riverbank.

Words dropped like spit
into the river
never forming thoughts
that might save us from ourselves.

I could not tell you
I love you; the air
would not hold
the sound of the words.

I could not hear you;
I am no lip reader
and you were wading
downstream in the current.

We had never borne witness 
to such quiet—not silence:
it was as if the wind had chosen
to carry other sounds, not ours.

Our agreement with the air—
ephemeral glyphs
traced by a fingertip
on infant skin,

sung to a dozing child—
had been forgotten;
the pact expired
after generations

failed to remind us of it.
No one whispered, “Oh, Sam,
before I go, don’t forget
your obligation to the air.” 

It was as if the larynx,
loom of the voice,
had lost the warp
of the air.

Even in a storm
I could have brought
my mouth
close to your ear,

cupped my hands,
and spoken over the gusts.
I kneel on riverbed gravel.
I am a clay tablet

for the grief of the air
inscribed on my knees
in the cuneiform
of wind-scattered pebbles.

 

Shade Lakes


Late September sunsets
in the shade lakes in the valleys
of the Colorado Rockies
hold liquid depths of absent light.

Steel crustaceans glint
as they dine on sediment, soil,
stone, ore, and trees
the way a king crab

samples the seabed for barnacles
and sunlight from the surface
reflects from its opening
and closing mandibles.

As we fly toward Denver,
shadows evaporate
into a plain of late fall
sunlight. Boulder houses,

revealed by window
reflections, emerge
on a plateau that was once
an ancient seabed.

See the fossils
of our future remains:
earth-throats of rare
earth mineshafts,

sclerotic vasculature
of superhighways,
skeletal concrete towers,
human coral we

recolonize every morning.
What will future species
make of the pacemaker
they recover from the calcium

birdcage where my lungs
and heart coordinated
the supply chain
of my light-devouring eyes?

“Nothing, darling,”
a nearby passenger sighs,
responding to a question
asked by someone else,

words at least one of us
utters every moment,
somewhere, in a multitude
of tongues, answering

a private question a spouse
whispers because nothing
is what we make of it all
and will be made of all of this.

Stephen Brockwell is an Ottawa poet. His book All of Us Reticent Here Together won the Archibald Lampman award in 2017. He is a software development director at the Environmental Systems Research Institute.

Two poems, by John Levy

 

Through the Cemetery

I take this detour again.
It's in my mind. Again I find
the small boy in a dark suit
that fits him, chosen by his mother,
and he has wandered 

away from the speeches again
and taken the small red rubber ball
out of his pocket to bounce
against a headstone. He doesn't care
that a stranger, me, has also wandered 

away from the words. He throws
and catches, throws
with the measured force of a boy
who knows what he's doing
among the dead.  

 

 

Beginning with a Line from an Email from John Phillips (12/12/25)

 

“I’ve been doing a bit too much thinking in my head.”

 

All my life I’ve had this head, with visiting

thoughts

keeping me company

along with what vanishes, as do

sentences─

and then here are the people

when they stay.

 

John Levy lives in Tucson. He is married to the painter Leslie Buchanan. His most recent book is 54 poems: selected & new (Shearsman Books, 2023). A chapbook, Vast Spaces, appeared in 2026 from above/ground press. He will have a book published soon by Yavanika Press and another book published in 2027 by Shearsman Books.

Two poems, by Mark Valentine

 

The Rhythm Machine

It calculates that I like
sunrise in a far galaxy
comet melodies
whistling stars
flying saucers
blue love, blue looks
lark rise as heard
by the third ear 

Good. It hasn’t
found out yet
about double syrup
the carnival apple
frozen orange juice
honey on the tongue
the ghost in the coffee cup
and the taste of winter 

 

 

Piccalilli Variations

cauliflower, carrot, courgette
red onion, cornflower, sugar, salt
cider vinegar, mustard, turmeric
fennel, coriander, cumin seeds 

cauliflower, cucumber, onions
green beans, vinegar, caster sugar
mustard powder, turmeric, garlic
flour, allspice, nutmeg, salt 

pickling onions, cauliflower, cucumber
french beans, malt vinegar, rock salt
muscovado sugar, cornflour, garlic
mustard seeds, ginger, turmeric 

cauliflower, cabbage, green beans
carrots, white vinegar, sugar
red chilli, green chilli, garlic
cumin, turmeric, mustard, salt 

cauliflower, courgette, shallots,
apple, caster sugar, cornflower
cider vinegar, root ginger, coriander
mustard seeds, turmeric, salt 

cider vinegar, cauliflower, marrow,
beans, onion, sugar, mustard,
cornflour, turmeric, coriander,
allspice, cinnamon, ginger, salt 

cauliflower, gherkins, silverskins
french beans, mustard seeds, salt
cider vinegar, honey, cinnamon
nutmeg, turmeric, ginger, cloves

Mark Valentine is from Northampton and now lives in Yorkshire. His short stories and essays are published by the independent presses Tartarus (UK), Swan River (Ireland), Sarob (France), Zagava (Germany) and others. His poetry has appeared in PN Review, Agenda, ink, sweat and tears, M58, dadakuku and elsewhere, and in chapbooks.

from Tone Poem: Starlight and Stardust, by Robert Sheppard

  

                                                                        for Jazz Ian Perry

Melissa Aldana, 12 Stars

ears
raised to the stars the
fastidious lead with its
jagged edges quick- 

            leaps its
            roiling arpeggio
            clutters 

and travels toward the ceiling –

Aldana’s stretching on her toe-tips
even as she dips
as low as
she can go side-stepping 

            the lure
            of Sonny Rollins
            by sliding into nervous flutters – 

                        signing off

she’s out, listening
to the piano rollicking in its not-quite-jazz
fracturedness: 

12 stars in tonal constellation
swimming above a turquoise eye

 

 

                                                                        Donny McCaslin, I Want More 

thrashing amid changes
not scared off the riff
skiddy bass stabby bass 

            the echoed sax
            belches and squeals
in total recognition as near to all
sounds at once as possible 

            now
            ‘Fly My Space Ship’
            totters off course on take off
synthethecised robotic drownings
caught across the drum’s slashed necessities – 

            extraterrestrial Bowie anthem rising into
            orbit – 

sky-high reverb trembles over the faces of the water
to summon mermen to
fishy annunciations 

                        before they dive
                        into the thickest
                        swell of noisome 

                        soundlessness

                       

                                                                        Miho Hazama’s m_unit, Beyond Orbit

light swirls at her fingertips
as she curls intervals
into elliptical orbit around her theme

but she releases capsules of spacewalking
            solo energy
            into fluidic sonic wave 

where we rest restlessly –

                                    pro-pulsed –

stellar patterning in the DNA
of Christian McBride’s bass 

            the building blocks
            of new musical life: 

a string section quivering –

soft-landing canons –

                                                multiple starlight –

 

 

Robert Sheppard lives in Liverpool, UK, and is the author of many books, including History or Sleep: Selected Poems (Shearsman), Elle - a verse novel (Broken Sleep), and Holme Fell: A Sample of Landscapes (Knives Forks and Spoons), with photographs by Trev Eales. The Robert Sheppard Companion is a book of essays on his work, from Shearsman, and The Meaning of Form is one of his critical works, from Palgrave. He blogs at  www.robertsheppard.blogspot.com

 

Two poems, by Kit Fryatt

 

air: maestoso

Freezing blockhouse. All the long night long. Sacking slapping in the squints. Whisht whisht says the wind. Never shuts the fuck up. Rain skivvers the yarrow ⁊ the purple loosestrife. Thrift. Hardy flowers. Don’t let’s compare them to the flush creeping up the naked gorge of Gabrielle d’Estrées. Or harebells to the blackrimmed downcast eyes of Rosamond Clifford. There were three of us in it. Bit crowded. Or crowfoot to the cup in which Floris stole into Blancheflor’s bower. Or sea campion to the grisaille breast of Agnès Sorel. Wouldn’t you think of the slaves who sang chwit chwit chwidogeith. The last llewyn queen sloping wounded into a craven den. The servants who carry druryes from cell to cell. Rolls reading my healing my honey the minding of thee is sweeter than manna in mouth. Hot cross buns. Holywhey. Wholewave. I am spurred through with thee. Queerfast.

Drouth causes leafdrop. False harvest. Haws before August ends. They seem to yearn towards us. Saying why. Why would you shit the nest like this. Sorrow congeals like the frost that’s later ⁊ later to come. This temperate zone worst on a fabric raddled with crime. Mean little crystals. Withheld tears of parted lovers. One buried in a barrow. A penny. Pendant moon. One crouched under a crag. Mickle mirk. Flowers ⁊ moon are metonyms for complacency. But those real oldtime craft wankers are going extinct. The Indo rang asking for comment on the president’s new spoken word album. That’s bait. Muted epiphany is a metonym for reactionary centrist. Two a penny. What you really care about is saving humans. The planet will be just fine. Well yeah. All the same. Give em to your sons. The yarrow ⁊  the purple loosestrife will be growing after us. Thrift. Even the struggling thirsty haws. From afar off (East Wall, Bull Island even) they seem to say

Wouldn’t you be well     No really wouldn’t you

 

 

 

air: rubicund

(i)

alighting with weight on the right foot, left turned out
arms cast separately, wings lost over
mm years ago at sea some cables off the nudist beach
the body chubby ⁊ unexceptional      the head (big) 

slightly turned, the eyes, once restoration cleared terrifying
deposits of black matter, silver-gilded, like
the ruddy face resembling polychromed stone
but blue, demure
topknot      ringlet      kisscurl 

next time at the departure gate
let’s not forget the rule about looking back

 

(ii) 

four-room flat deep in the complex
the heart’s walls striated by sorrow’s twine
can’t wait for summer ⁊ summer’s gone
the last old blush vandalised by rain 

⁊ a bronze bagman in a borrowed jacket
loafing on a traffic island feels more than I can
what has twined my love from me?
sickly planes absorb particulate matter
stare back along the road until the waters meet again

 

 

Kit Fryatt is a lecturer in English at Dublin City University. His most recent book of poems is Book of Inversions, co-authored with Harry Gilonis (Veer 2, 2025). Another book, all things that are passing, a collaboration with Ellen Dillon, is forthcoming from Spite Press in 2026.

Two Poems, by Pearl Pirie

 

jeep in a teacup! what a covet object
 

will I forget, or regret lost chance? want want want
like a loon song echoing across the night lake. 

it means something symbolic but what is it
trying to grasp? the need beyond the object… 

skip the middleman of purchase and hook ankle
around tree as I stumble, leda clay slide. 

by daylight’s sidewalk scramble the purity of
desire is masked, jumbled into Everything Else 

in personal semblance of Citizen Kane, mementoes
with memories escape like radon. 

lines of chipped statues, icons of youth, dusty
drop cloths over display cases of prowess 

in the warehouse of regrettables that is usually
dubbed overflow past, usually locked up tight 

but something jiggling has me jimmying my way
in squeezing sideways through stacks 

for lack of better way to distract myself from
fraught hope. what habits are making me? 

if I used a forklift to shift or ram these pallets,
I’d get no exercise or order. Michelangelo’s rays 

but no eureka. my distress is sacred and can’t
be wasted, frittered vaguely on what-ifs.

after hours of talking, music then windshield wipers

"mere prattle without practice"
Iago, Othello 

oncoming transport trailers are
exclamation points tumbling over hills 

all these comma cars come on
tired as a Karma Chameleon. 

I’ve concentrated for hours
at a snow screen of star fields. 

there are podcasts from places
I’ve never been but diverting still. 

did your kindergarten class also
draw crayon fishes? my coelacanth's gills. 

then a distressing wash
of black, but it rolls off fish scales 

the defiant yellow fins, each sheet
an aquarium in cinderblock jail.

Pearl Pirie's fourth published poetry collection was footlights (Radiant Press, 2020). rain’s smallg estures (Apt 9 Press, Sept 2021) is her chapbook of minimalist poems which won the 2022 Nelson Ball Prize. Her most recent is, Heat Lamp (above/ground, 2025) Her author site is www.pearlpirie.com

Three poems, by Colin Dardis

 

 

Ghosts Out There

All these ghosts with their spray cans
writing their name across the city
trying to convince us that they exist
as if bricks offer validity

  

 

Mid-March

The empty
papier-mâché nest
hung as a gift from
an optimistic child,
the birds waiting until
the camouflage of leaves. 

 

 

An Elastic Complacency

a glove of hand sanitiser
before pressing the button
at the traffic lights
        you have to wait
        for the green
light from the government
before staying outside
for more than an hour 

in prison,
they get daily constitutionals
in a yard
        here, we go walking
        and then return to our cells 

subjugated for our own health
        and all healths 

the revolution was televised
but the conquest was invisible
        a breath
        a touch
        a trace 

and now
we cross the road
back to normality
        an old dress
        slipped on
        and immediately
        we return to ourselves 

now the conquest
is like a strange neighbour
you hear through the walls
but rarely see
        they leave their bins out
        and don’t collect them in 

and we return
to old homes
with opened curtains

 

Colin Dardis is the author of ten poetry collections, most recently with the lakes (above/ground press, 2023). A neurodivergent poet, editor and sound artist, he currently co-hosts the Poetry Poetry open mic night in Belfast, and is editor of the poetry blog, Poem Alone.