Len Webster Poems

Since when did caution
become a term of abuse,
to be spat vindictively
at those who would prevent
...

The night noisy with cicada shrills,
Distant voices from other village compounds.
Here the old woman talks to her hemiplegic daughter,
Whose childless status hangs heavily like irrational guilt.
...

We go on writing, beating ourselves up,
Shredding experience into words, fragments
To be re-shaped for a future self to read,
Or (ideally) some real other to replace the imaginary.
...

I lie outside with Lorca,
A voice unknown to my kind.
But 'kind' means many things:
KIND or KINDER, kin, 'kind'...
...

You wake up heavy-headed
And you start to sing the Blues.
You turn the radio on
And get the early morning news.
...

Sometimes he does not like himself very much.
Even on days when he thinks he's fine
There's this gnawing sense in his mind
That he is, quite simply, not very nice.
...

He knows that
bicycles aren't mainly found in undredged canals
skeletons won't be found in graveyards
or ashes in tea urns in a front room
...

They stripped me down beyond bare essentials -
Even now I can't tell the new from the old -
Dressed me in the finest green and black livery
As if for a second coronation.
...

Half-asleep. Ever awake
To the terrors
That sleep can bring.
...

He knows that
bicycles aren't mainly found in undredged canals
skeletons won't be found in graveyards
or ashes in tea urns in a front room
...