DOGS OF UNYE

Black Sea

Feral dogs are playing on the beach,

they come here to be out of reach

of park attendants chasing them

and policemen in the central square

where head-scarved women chat

at the cake festival, contestants

in the precision craft of sponge.

Banks are not dispensing cash,

you get your Lira at jewellery stores

as the owners squirrel currency

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ARRIVAL OF CONCRETE

The old woman pottered

in a coal-dark house

with an inscrutable history 

from before our time;

she'd shout at kids

who messed in the meadow.

Buttercups and poppies

scattered colour

across that wild expanse

where dock leaves

apparently cured nettle stings

and the travellers said

the field contained

cures for most ailments.

T...

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WOODEN ZOO

I recall when you arrived

six months old in your pram

and your parents so young,

says Dorothy at the gate.

A daughter lost to cancer,

the oldest son a heart attack

climbing up a mountain.

He came to play with us

just once, back then

and we sniggered at his

peculiar way of talking

and wouldn't let him touch

the wooden zoo I owned

that held m...

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ISOLATION

I dreamed they moved the forest

as I watched from a window

never suspecting such impermanence;

scenery rolled like a stage set,

replaced by things more essential.

No trees, and in their stead rose

abodes of relentless brick

and from inside came starry toddlers,

women who looked through me,

hooded men with meagre histories.

I was irrelevant to th...

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