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Likestarlings is a place for talking in poems. We pair poets with poets and they write a sequence of six new works by responding in turn to one another. Our palaver blog goes beyond poetry to discuss collaboration in theory and in practice. Please take a look, and feel free to add comments, opinions and suggestions here. Read poems here
 

Artist in residence, ski lodge


Somebody is looking for Lisa in the base camp:
The girl you visualise in every novel, out of focus,
Whose compliments transfigure the world like snow.
Yes, every newspaper is an anagram insulting you
And you alone at length should you take it that way.
Yes, you are a clerk who files, lovingly, evil tidings.
Like me you wake up ill and unoriginal, a brick
Wrapped in Parma ham, hating even the bold
Pencil lines and charcoal smudges. Call it subfusc:
My subfusc town, my subfusc family, my numbered,
Subfusc tomorrows. Heart-shaped drinking cabins.
My aspirations dated as a record deal, a living room
Step ladder accident, jacknifed with the pebble infantry.
Water spilled on parquet floor, a skiing magazine,
Open on an advert for skiing. The skiers leave
Before the Gospel reading to ski. The homily
Would have gone over their heads anyway.