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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
 

A dance to rouse peasants’ laughter


And how then do they decorate their houses?
With miniature country scenes and animals
made out of fur clippings and venison and marble.

On the mantelpiece their wives might put a model
of a hedgehog which looks much like a vagina.

And how then do they court our wives and mistresses?
With ‘well hel-lo!’s said in the fanciest way possible,
and fingers working neatly in their laps.

Sometimes at night the sallow yellow moon
hangs like an old man’s ballbag.

And how then do they set about complaining?
With faces like a helicopter flung across the sky.
They like to fling their toys across the room
when they are tired of such games.

In the museum, there is a glass case full of armour
with their great grandfathers’ names on it.
But they would not be constrained by their own titles.