Tom Chivers

Frag(ment)s: VI

Spilt across a mechanised trackway, Eileen House absorbs the solar flares. Petulant orb commanding eyelines, level and rise. Human disinterest. Spliced, in international waters, you told them the baby was still / inside you.

Frag(ment)s: V

Pastel turns and we unfold like an aircraft hangar in a field of gold translucent rape. Glaze & stir. My name is Simon. I am your train guard, your personal shopper. Hardware flocks. Green beyond limits. Cartilage locks a vista into –

Frag(ment)s: IV

Cherished pathways back-mutate to nodes. Insist the marshes, the herbals. Static blends. Blue is righteous accident; the young are pale in sci-fi jodhpurs, paintball facemasks. Imbibe them now –

Frag(ment)s: III

Pale globe inset, you hive. Resist the televisual. There are heavenly musics; turn towards the mirrored screen. Yes, pulse thickens. You. Silver orange blue –

Frag(ment)s: II

Router is a deep blue. Certain interests of a mercantile nature such as speed and theft. You’ve worked out how to get here? Timing’s key. Through snowfall, radio cars, bank collapse the visionary comes –

Frag(ment)s: I

Memorised, such as it is. Fringe benefits are nobody’s concern. Translate this: from here to the end of _____ Street you can withdraw cash six or seven times. Over again. Censorious streets, how you suckle me –

Chingonyi on Chivers

Having previously written on The Terrors, Kayo Chingonyi has now turned his critical eye towards my collection How To Build A City. In his review for Eyewear, Kayo has lots of very interesting and acute things to say about my poems, particularly the 7/7 sequence ‘Rush Hour’ and the title poem. He concludes (I repeat this for myContinue reading “Chingonyi on Chivers”

Ebay advert for dolls vs Michel Foucault’s The Spectacle of the Scaffold (a mash-up)

A nice lot of Sindy A 1975 ballet body with ball joint hands that are stuck fast to the arms, double cup waist a torch of burning wax All legs click and hold well reduced to ashes his ashes finally Some toes have bite marks doll has lost two fingers and thumb she has hingedContinue reading “Ebay advert for dolls vs Michel Foucault’s The Spectacle of the Scaffold (a mash-up)”

Desert Island Discs: No.4 ‘My Girls’

This is just glorious: ‘My Girls’ by Animal Collective, from their 2009 album Merriweather Post Pavilion. Slow build, partial release… Jittery glittery gold! For the full effect, enter a darkened room, put your headphones on and turn the volume up to 11 🙂

A New Kind of Street Ballad

So, I didn’t quite make the Michael Marks Award. That honour rightly goes to Selima Hill for her outstanding Flarestack pamphlet. Any (mild) disappointment was erased by the privilege of hearing an exhilirating, learned and empassioned speech by Ali Smith. She was one of three judges, alongside Jo Shapcott and Richard Price. A speech so good it was republished inContinue reading “A New Kind of Street Ballad”