My skull is an occupied
sofa. When someone
makes a home in your head—
no room for poems.
*
Rachel McAlpine
Month: January 2016
Comfort noise
Hello? Hello?
After you hang up
your obsolete handpiece
after you go,
comfort noise
swells through the holes.
*
Rachel McAlpine
Trigonometry blues
I made a mistake
at Maths Club
in my youth.
Logarithms, algorithms,
and then the aftermath.
*
Rachel McAlpine
The poetry class
Tiger words and kitten words.
Allusion and plagiarism.
Repetition and retraction.
Patterns and shocks.
Rip out the murderous.
Break the relentless.
Quip over cleverness.
Stop the clocks.
Perfectly perfect?
Chuck it away.
Rich and rubbishy?
Chocks away.
*
Rachel McAlpine
Poem about money
The poems I have lost are many
and many and many and more.
For instance, where is that
jingle about suspenders?
Now I am writing poems
about money. Poor money.
No one writes poetry for you:
there isn’t any.
*
Rachel McAlpine
I’ve got a poem
I’ve got a poem half written
like I’ve got a new lover
and I don’t want to say who he is
yet.
Wherever it is, the poem is the centre
of the room. All the time
I am making the bed, going for a jog,
taking a shower,
the poem rings.
Can it wait? What’ll I say?
A thin flame runs up my legs.
On the bus I think of other poems.
Now I have six half-written.
I am a slut
with petrol in my hair.
*
Rachel McAlpine
Poetry pips
Squish the words.
Spit the pips.
That’s a poem.
Not the squish
but the pips.
*
Rachel McAlpine
Poem in a phone
Squash a sonnet
to a pellet
with a mallet.
Did it!
*
Rachel McAlpine
Why you write
You write because
you decide to write
when a sudden jagged
uninvited light
bites the eye of your mind.
You write because
you don’t not write
the way you used to
not write.
*
Rachel McAlpine
Listen to reason
Listen to reason.
This won’t take long.
You’re reading.
I’m writing.
That makes us
born lucky
dead lucky.
*
Rachel McAlpine
Poems in the wild—Rachel McAlpine 