#SelectedPoetry – May

As May unfolds, The Broken Spine is delighted to present a collection of poetry that mirrors the depth and diversity of the human spirit. This month, our editors David Hanlon and Katie Jenkins have carefully selected works that explore the nuances of existence, the beauty of the mundane, and the poignant moments that define our lives. Each poet brings a unique voice to the fore, offering insights into the complexities of memory, identity, and the landscapes that shape our personal narratives.

Michelle Diaz, with her rich background in poetry, graces our selection with Unspoken, a deeply moving piece that navigates the terrain of loss and the unspoken words that linger in the wake of absence. Diaz’s ability to capture the subtleties of emotion and the nuances of memory invites readers into a reflective journey, reminding us of the moments that often go unnoticed but deeply felt.

Lorraine Carey, hailing from the scenic landscapes of Donegal and now residing in Kerry, offers The Fustiness of Waiting, a poignant exploration of waiting and the passage of time. Through vivid imagery and a keen sense of place, Carey’s poetry speaks to the resilience of the human spirit, the enduring presence of nature, and the quiet moments of beauty found in everyday life.

Alex Rankin’s Promotion delves into the complexities of loss and the roles we are thrust into during times of grief. With a unique voice that emerged from a mentorship with a surrealist poet, Rankin’s work challenges our perceptions of the finality of death and the bureaucratic nuances that accompany it, offering a fresh perspective on the emotional landscapes we navigate.

Penny Ayers brings to life the ancient and mystical with Wish Tree, a poem that bridges the gap between the tangible and the ethereal. Ayers’ ability to weave together the natural world with the deep-seated desires of the human heart invites readers to ponder the connections between us and the enduring symbols of hope and longing that stand steadfast through the ages.

Finola Cahill’s It Was a Mime Actually captures the fleeting moments of connection and the search for familiarity in a crowded world. Cahill’s poetry, marked by its vivid imagery and emotional depth, explores the themes of memory, longing, and the transient nature of our encounters, leaving readers to ponder the intersections of our paths and the ghosts of presence that linger in our minds.

This May, join us in embracing the profound and the poignant, the whispered and the celebrated, as we explore the landscapes of the human condition through the lens of poetry. Each poem in our selection offers a window into the soul, a reflection on the complexities of life, and an invitation to find beauty and meaning in the moments that define us.

Michelle Diaz

Michelle Diaz has been published by 14 Magazine, Poetry Wales and numerous journals. Her debut pamphlet ‘The Dancing Boy’ was published by Against the Grain in 2019. She is working on her first full-length collection.

X: @Michell70881630 

Instagram: michellediazpoetry

Unspoken

Everywhere else in the country
it was June, but in Middlesborough,
it was November. That year, the sky 
didn’t know it was summer.

I spent my days hop-scotching, oblivious 
to the whispery trees overhead.
I played out at lonely dusk, 
until the moon signalled me home.

I ate alone; Hovis soldiers dipped in egg,
then I’d undress and wash, with a remnant of soap.
To lift the days, I read my Ladybird 
picture dictionary. The one mum bought 
for my fifth birthday. I learnt the words;

laburnum
weasel
nightingale

My bird-whistling made the grown-ups angry.
Nobody had told me it was bad to be happy
when someone is dying.

I didn’t know you were dying.
They said you were on holiday.

That was the year of the ladybirds—
pulling red squish from my pigtails,
watching the windscreen wipers wash them away.

My best friend bought me a card.
She asked how I was, with a weird face.
Her arm around my shoulder confused me.

By August the walls were talking.
I ditched my dictionary and tuned in.
I heard dad crying, and learnt the words;

tumour
coma
funeral 

Lorraine Carey

Lorraine Carey’s poems are widely anthologised and have appeared in Magma, Poetry Ireland Review, The Cormorant, Panoply, Gyroscope Review, Orbis, Prole, Rust + Moth, One, The High Window, The Honest Ulsterman and Ink Sweat &Tears among others. Originally from Greencastle, Donegal, she now lives in Kerry. 

The Fustiness of Waiting

Father’s still here collecting books;
still has a decent lung, half of the other
and his own teeth. He still reads like 
there’s no tomorrow, delighting in 
charity shop finds; in musty first editions 
whose yellowing pages and embossed spines 

remind him of fusty petrichor.
He still paints birds, keeping buckets
by the sill filled with sunflower hearts, nuts
and pumpkin seeds; still decrees birdwatching 
supreme, surpassing telly’s drivel, favouring
a fatball swivel from a cup hook in a breeze.

He still waits by the window for the pheasant’s
strut, listening for the beak tap on glass
if feeders aren’t replenished. He still crooks 
his thumb on upper garments, his greying
vest stretched as patience – flesh falling from 
him like snow off guttering. He still

mutters dissent when she gorges on death, 
disease and the filling of cemetery plots, 
instead of acknowledging the grief of 
a redpoll’s summer breast, feeding on 
the planed log stump, smooth 
as a sea glass nugget. 

He carries loss like a bone collector.
He still remembers Tryfan, the pillars
Cain and Abel just shy of the summit. 
He’s still climbing it in his sleep. 

Alex Rankin

Alex is a writer from Bristol, UK. He has been writing short stories since primary school, but discovered poetry after undertaking a mentorship with a surrealist poet in 2020.

Work has been published in journals such as A Thin Slice of Anxiety, Black Nore Review and The Hyacinth Review.

X: @alexrankin7

Promotion

Executor is a bleak title
too close to the firing squad
or maybe like chief executive
as if you’ve been promoted
to delete your loved one from record.

Penny Ayers

Penny Ayers has been published online and in various magazines, including ‘Ink, Sweat and Tears’, ‘Spelt’, ‘Dear Reader’ and in various anthologies including Grey Hen’s ‘Phenomenal Women’ and Cheltenham Poetry Society’s ‘The Elements’. She helps run the Gloucestershire Writers’ Network.

Wish Tree

Rollright Stones

You tie them to me—
coloured ribbons, bead bracelet,

wooden coffee spoon, 
cut-out heart—

a carnival of rags 
knotted to my bare branches.

Their sway and rustle 
in a lean wind stirs my rest, 

tracks through my roots 
down into the land of the old stories.

Wish for me that I’ll be
kept from storm and thunderstrike,

fire and drought,
the axeman’s cut,

and I’ll hold them for you
through the long cold,

dreaming of the wishes I’ll hang—
each pinch of green, 

each palm of light,
each wave to the warm sun.

Finola Cahill

Finola Cahill is a writer from Co. Mayo, Ireland. Her poetry has appeared in the London Magazine, An Capall Dorcha, and others. In 2023 she won the Waterford Poetry Prize and was shortlisted for the Fish, Bridport, and Cheltenham poetry prizes, and the Listowel Writers Week Collection award. www.finolacahill.com

X: @finolala

Instagram: @fifinolala

It Was a Mime Actually

There was a busker, between two streets, two streets like neon pipes on the fester blinking pharmacy sign, green cross swallows and swallows and swallows and spits light, I watch it, the busker, singing well, people clump, I think of egg yolk added to breadcrumb, or playdough left out a little too long, I want to go but don’t because I’m tired and navigating/apologising a body through many bodies – a bag of marbles hitting against each other so violently but never breaking while something bigger swings the sack around to hear the sea-bells of glass fighting, smacking against each other – is exhausting – the rotational capacity of your shoulder is something you take for granted when younger, & also all the things you don’t have to carry, all the marbles you don’t have to think about, look for. In the crowd I see someone from behind who could be you. The gradient on the shoulder is right, and the hair catches black in the spinning rim of approaching night, and the way December wears the silhouette rings familiar in my mind. This moves me. I step closer, but then back, because like looking at a painting, if I get too close I’ll see the brush strokes, and I don’t want detail that would mark this out as not you. Here is a crease in a world, where you’re on your way home from Christmas shopping and stopped to listen to a tune, you have someone beside you, you are not alone, you are not – I am alone here, and wish I had at least one of a particular vintage of friend to stand beside, grab, squeeze the hard & soft space above the elbow, have them look, confirm, that, there, it’s just like him, if we stand just here, still. Cold hangs off of the real parts of me, toothy. I step closer, and then I leave.