Most Read... John McAuliffeBill Manhire in Conversation with John McAuliffe
(PN Review 259)
Patricia CraigVal Warner: A Reminiscence
(PN Review 259)
Joshua WeinerAn Exchange with Daniel Tiffany/Fall 2020
(PN Review 259)
Eavan BolandA Lyric Voice at Bay
(PN Review 121)
Vahni CapildeoOn Judging Prizes, & Reading More than Six Really Good Books
(PN Review 237)
Christopher MiddletonNotes on a Viking Prow
(PN Review 10)
Next Issue Sinead Morrissey 'The Lightbox' Philip Terry 'What is Poetry' Ned Denny 'Nine Poems after Verlaine' Sasha Dugdale 'On learning that Russian mothers buy their soldier sons lucky belts inscribed with Psalm 90 to wear into battle' Rod Mengham 'Cold War Hot Air'
Poems Articles Interviews Reports Reviews Contributors
Reader Survey
PN Review Substack

This poem is taken from PN Review 33, Volume 10 Number 1, September - October 1983.

Without Contraries Rodney Pybus

The gale brandishes my big glass
in its frame, its streaming face.
I watch December driven to its early dark.
Darker still in this room where sun
might gloss through tangy geraniums

the bookshelves' long faded opera.
But not today. Draft on draft ooze
their mazy scribble across the floor.
Cats rightly doze on puzzled artifice.
The desklamp bulb has a frigid stare.

This mouldwarp's petite civilisation
falls at a loss before the last charge
of the year. Or so it seems.
I hear the metal gate going tut-tut-tut.
Opening or closing, I can't tell.

Leaping to the phone, I twist an ankle
...


Searching, please wait... animated waiting image