Photo by Toa Heftiba on Unsplash

Damon Moore runs an arts project in Frome, Somerset. He has a particular interest in the narrative style but his short-form poetry has found a home in RAUM, The Literateur, Eyot and Forage amongst others. He is travelling somewhere in Europe at present and gathering material for ’28Articles’, a Brexit related poetry-film series under development for his YouTube channel. 

This poem was also featured in Issue Two of Porridge, available for purchase here.

To A Certain Summer Evening
(for Rosemary Tonks)

Some critic got it about right,
lanterns over dhows.
I’ll do it on my own then,
no more woods or stitchwort for me, (thanks anyway!).
I’ll explain to my poor love,
this scorched summer evening, (almost arctic),
now recuperating, visit it – at least.

I will say in a great snatch
why I don’t think I shall write again on civilisation,
so light-weight, why in the end
poets go in for those fake shows of unity,
(poets are not the only ones!).

I loved the bluntedness of evening’s end,
the leviathan pitch and roll.
I could be that or me – but hardly both.