Sudden Prose Reprints: Isabel Galleymore's 'True Animal'

 

True Animal

On a dozy summer's day, a donkey magpied a lion's skin that the hunters had left to dry in the sun. What else had the donkey to do, but chameleon himself inside it? As he swanned across the paddock in his new ferocious fur, the horse began to mouse, the hare grew chicken-hearted, and the chicken hared away. How good it felt to shark among the shrimp, he thought, and let out a proud hee-haw... The daisies widened their eyes. Mid-run, the chicken stopped. The hare, and then the mouse, dared themselves to look. Finding not claws but hooves, each turned upon him and, as any true animal would, parroted a short teaching on natures true and fox. 

Isabel Galleymore
Significant Other (Carcanet, 2019)

Sudden Prose Reprints: "Sunday, with the television off" by William Letford

Sunday, with the television off

I think of the future. My death bed. I imagine the man I will be. Then I pay that man a visit. Ask him, what would you do?

So I leave the car and walk across town. Knock on my father's door to say hello and listen to his stories, the ones I've heard before.

It's like I've travelled in time. Now he knows that someone is listening. On the way home, the sun falls behind the buildings, and I walk into a supermarket.

William Letford
Bevel (Carcanet, 2012)


My thanks to Carcanet Press for permission to use this poem. You can buy Bevel directly from them here. 

 

Sudden Prose Reprints: "Winter in the World" by William Letford

Winter in the world

The old lady struggles, footsteps careful, leaving shuffle marks in the snow. No shopping bag, so maybe it's church, and maybe not. Perhaps she is out for a walk, because she can, and the night is spare, and she is undiminished and harder than bone.

William Letford
Bevel (Carcanet, 2012)


Many thanks to Carcanet Press for permission to reprint this poem. You can buy Bevel on their website here.