Most Read... Rebecca WattsThe Cult of the Noble Amateur
(PN Review 239)
John McAuliffeBill Manhire in Conversation with John McAuliffe
(PN Review 259)
Eavan BolandA Lyric Voice at Bay
(PN Review 121)
Patricia CraigVal Warner: A Reminiscence
(PN Review 259)
Vahni CapildeoOn Judging Prizes, & Reading More than Six Really Good Books
(PN Review 237)
Tim Parksin conversation with Natalia Ginzburg
(PN Review 49)
Next Issue Hal Coase 'Ochre Pitch' Gregory Woods 'On Queerness' Kirsty Gunn 'On Risk! Carl Phillips' Galina Rymbu 'What I Haven't Written' translated by Sasha Dugdale Gabriel Josipovici 'No More Stories' Valerie Duff-Strautmann 'Anne Carson's Wrong Norma'
Poems Articles Interviews Reports Reviews Contributors
PN Review 275
PN Review Substack

This poem is taken from PN Review 72, Volume 16 Number 4, March - April 1990.

Two Poems John Holloway

Getting Up in the Night

'In the Land of the Living?'
     Yes. But wait a bit. No.
Being like this, only living the way
     of a sleepy chrysalis

as I stumble across the landing,
     groping not to fall
down the stairs; or asleep again
    against that shadowed wall.

But no need for the light.
    Glints and dark glows - amber,
greenish, cemetery white,
    flake in from the square

through cracks between curtains;
    enough for three o'clock eyes;
enough...so touch button and -
    Niagara. Drudge back
...


Searching, please wait... animated waiting image