Extracts
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An Easy Passage
by Julia Copus Once she is halfway up there, crouched in her bikini on the porch roof of her family’s house, trembl… read more ⇝
Blessing
by Imtiaz Dharker The skin cracks like a pod. There never is enough water. Imagine the drip of it, the small splash, e… read more ⇝
Chainsaw vs The Pampas Grass
by Simon Armitage It seemed an unlikely match. All winter unplugged, grinding its teeth in a plastic sleeve, the chain… read more ⇝
Do not go gentle into that good night
by Dylan Thomas Do not go gentle into that good night, Old age should burn and rave at close of day; Rage, rage agai… read more ⇝
Eat Me
by Patience Agbadi When I hit thirty, he brought me a cake, three layers of icing, home-made, a candle for each stone i… read more ⇝
Effects
by Alan Jenkins I held her hand, that was always scarred From chopping, slicing, from the knives that lay in wait In… read more ⇝
Genetics
by Sinead Morrissey My father’s in my fingers, but my mother’s in my palms. I lift them up and look at them with pleasur… read more ⇝
Giuseppe
by Roderick Ford My Uncle Giuseppe told me that in Sicily in World War Two, in the courtyard behind the aquarium, whe… read more ⇝
Half-Caste
by John Agard Excuse me Standing on one leg I’m half-caste Explain yuself Wha yu mean When yu say half-caste Yu me… read more ⇝
History
by John Burnside St Andrews: West Sands; September 2001 Today as we flew the kites - the sand spinning off in ribbons… read more ⇝
If-
by Rudyard Kipling If you can keep your head when all about you Are losing theirs and blaming it on you, … read more ⇝
Journal of a Disappointed Man
by Andrew Motion I discovered these men driving a new pile into the pier. There was all the paraphernalia of chains, … read more ⇝
La Belle Dame Sans Merci
by John Keats O what can ail thee, knight-at-arms, Alone and palely loitering? The sedge has withered from … read more ⇝
Material
by Ros Barber My mother was a hanky queen when hanky meant a thing of cloth, not paper tissues bought in packs fro… read more ⇝
My Last Duchess
by Robert Browning FERRARA: That’s my last Duchess painted on the wall, Looking as if she were alive. I call That piece… read more ⇝
Ode to a Grayson Perry Urn
by Tim Turnbull Hello! What’s all this here? A kitschy vase some Shirley Temple manqué has knocked out delineating t… read more ⇝
On Her Blindness
by Adam Thorpe My mother could not bear being blind, to be honest. One shouldn’t say it. One should hide the fact t… read more ⇝
Out Of The Bag
by Seamus Heaney I All of us came in Doctor Kerlin’s bag. He’d arrive with it, disappear to the room And by the time … read more ⇝
Piano
by D H Lawrence Softly, in the dusk, a woman is singing to me; Taking me back down the vista of years, till I see A … read more ⇝
Prayer Before Birth
by Louis MacNeice I am not yet born; O hear me. Let not the bloodsucking bat or the rat or the stoat or the club-foote… read more ⇝
Remember Me
by Christina Rossetti Remember me when I am gone away, Gone far away into the silent land; When you can no more hold me by… read more ⇝
Romeo & Juliet: Scene 1
by William Shakespeare Enter Abram and Balthasar. SAMPSON. My naked weapon is out: quarrel, I will back thee. GREGORY. How?… read more ⇝
Search For My Tongue
by Sujata Bhatt You ask me what I mean by saying I have lost my tongue. I ask you, what would you do if you had two … read more ⇝
Sonnet 116
by William Shakespeare Let me not to the marriage of true minds Admit impediments; love is not love Which alters when i… read more ⇝
The Deliverer
by Tishani Joshi OUR LADY OF THE LIGHT CONVENT, KERALA The sister here is telling my mother How she came to collect c… read more ⇝
The Furthest Distances I've Travelled
by Leontia Flynn Like many folk, when first I saddled a rucksack, feeling its weight on my back – the way my spine cu… read more ⇝
The Gun
by Vicki Feaver Bringing a gun into a house changes it. You lay it on the kitchen table, stretched out like somethin… read more ⇝
The Lammas Hireling
by Ian Duhig After the fair, I’d still a light heart and a heavy purse, he struck so cheap. And cattle doted on h… read more ⇝
The Soldier
by Rupert Brooke If I should die, think only this of me: That there’s some corner of a foreign field That i… read more ⇝
The Tyger
by William Blake Tyger Tyger, burning bright, In the forests of the night; What immortal hand or eye, Could frame thy… read more ⇝
The Violence of Romeo and Juliet
The story of Romeo & Juliet is surely as old as time. Taken from the British Library’s abb on … read more ⇝
To My Nine-Year Old Self
by Helen Dunmore You must forgive me. Don’t look so surprised, perplexed , and eager to be gone balancing on your han… read more ⇝
War Photographer
by Carol Ann Duffy In his dark room he is finally alone with spools of suffering set out in ordered rows. The only ligh… read more ⇝