The Friday Poem

A poem every Friday

New Frip

Photo showing a jumble of children's plastic dolls in a state of disrepair.

Curiosities for the curious

Clare Best reviews Wunderkammer by Helen Ivory (MadHat Press, 2023)
Blurred black and white photograph of a woman walking with an umbrella.

Sunset over Sky dishes

Maggie Mackay reviews 20 by Holly Magill (Drunk Muse Press, 2023)
Dark red line drawing on light red paper. It shows a small house. A ladder protrudes from an upstairs window and heads upwards.

As if to map the hidden history

Isabelle Thompson reviews Cargo by Charlotte Gann (Mariscat Press, 2023)
I think it's wool. Mostly blue but with th occasional red splurge. Oh, and there are some, drops of water that look frozen.

Alley Sally, Flash Face, Do-No-Day

Jane Routh reviews Material Properties by Jacob Polley (Picador, 2023)
Close up photo of a white sheeps head. We can mostly see the eye.

Tiny shorts the colour of meringues

Annie Fisher reviews Women in Comfortable Shoes by Selima Hill (Bloodaxe Books, 2023)
A book cover showing what looks like two purple tinted, torn paper images of a woman's face . One shows two eyes and a bit of nose, the other shows one eye , half a nose and a mouth.

‘What is the language using us for?’

Helena Nelson reviews Isdal by Susannah Dickey (Picador, 2023)
Some black and white text (part of the book title) on a red background. For extra 'artistic design' points the text lines are slanted diagonally.

Duster Bennett live at Frank Freeman’s

Matthew Paul reviews New and Selected Poems by Cliff Yates (Smith|Doorstop, 2023)
Photograph showing a streets in Leeds city center. They are empty apart from one figure in the middle of the street

There is a happy land

Ian Harker looks at the poetry scene in Leeds
Bookshelf photograph showing various titles and...inexplicably a glass of water. Water? Absinthe maybe...but water?

The toad, the child, the sapling

Richard Meier treats us to a tour of his poetry bookshelf
Saint George and the Dragon, a painting by Paolo Uccello. . It shows a scene from the famous story of Saint George and the Dragon. On the right, George is spearing the beast, and on the left, the princess is using her belt as a leash to take the dragon up to the town. The eye in the storm gathering on the right of Saint George is lined up with his spear showing there has been divine intervention. The painting is commonly interpreted as an illustration of the legend of St. George as recounted in the Golden Legend. However, Stanford professor Emanuele Lugli has suggested an alternative reading: that the work functions as propaganda, encouraging Florentine elites to adopt agriculture. In medieval symbolism, the dragon was a symbol of pollution, and St. George's slaying of the creature can be seen as a metaphorical reclamation of the land, leading to a pure water source located in a cave.

This barter of enthusiasm 9

Helen Evans, Rachel Burns and Oliver Comins choose poems by U. A. Fanthorpe, Bobby Parker and Tishani Doshi
Photo of Jackie Wills. She has long brown hair with flecks of grey, and red lipstick.

The cutty’s goistering

The Friday Poem talks to poet and gardener Jackie Wills
Photograph a woman standing in sand with a coat on. She has left footprints.

Our small Homeric lives

Steven Lovatt reviews Dead Letters by Carole Coates (Shoestring, 2023)