Home

Home

A pretty parcel
Wrapped up in red.
Before me the bow comes
Away like burned skin and
The paper, retorting in
Agony, reveals a perfect
Little house; the teacups
Tilted in the minute
Sideboard drawer. Tiny neat
Beds, soaked in scarlet
And haunted by scathing portieres
And as light pours in through frosted
Glass the mother in the kitchen
Takes to her mouth a poisoned chalice.
Daddy isn’t here. And you, a skeletal
Frame on which clothes hang,
Stand ? ourselves separated by
A universe.

‘Home’ was a winning poem in the 2019 Newcastle Young People’s Poetry Competition.