Friday 15 November 2019

A poem by Robin Houghton

I've long been a fan of Robin Houghton's poetry, which is why I'm very pleased she'll be reading with us at Rogue Strands on 28th November (see Facebook page here, etc, etc...). Moreover, today's poem provides us with an excellent example of what makes her work different.

This piece invokes thematic tensions - inner and outer, open and closed, animate and inanimate, city and country - and ramps them up via a subtle control of line endings and stanza breaks. All these qualities contribute to a deceptively profound, implicit meditation on life in one of the biggest capitals in the world...



30 St Mary Axe


Sun boots up from the ArcelorMittal
Orbit, swings a low arc to Wembley –
no place to hide when you're
this high.

The temperature inside is set fair. Inner
and outer airs kept apart. No-one
feels a draught or needs to breathe
in the city.

On rainy days you look from below
and it’s gone in a trick of the eye, enough
to tremble hearts, turn heads to check
for St Paul’s.

Its stories are etched from diamonds,
a thousand or more – its panes unable
to open, unlikely to break: strong
as a threat

so no-one inside may throw stones,
or listen for the honking of Barnacle geese
flying east in a V, or mistake the sky
for sea.


(An earlier version of this poem was first published in Brittle Star).

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