Postcards from Malthusia DAY SIXTY-ONE: Bob Beagrie

Dies Irae 

 

The vacant kirk clings to foundations

with iron pins riven through palms

of faith to resist reversals

of random gravities, days shaken

in a dice-pot then spilled

to form fresh readings

raptor sky-swirl seeking rapture,

catkins dangle – ropes to glory;

this round ends the next begins,

so pay your tithe if you want in;

the river wakes, takes to wing,

toted like a new-born

on its palanquin

by cardinal water fowl

in singing procession,

circling wider over sand and sea,

their evening requiem:

Day of wrath and doom impending

Heaven and earth in ashes ending.

 

 

Bob Beagrie has published numerous collections of poetry and several pamphlets, most recently And Then We Saw The Daughter of the Minotaur (The Black Light Engine Press 2020), Civil Insolencies (Smokestack 2019),  Remnants written with Jane Burn (Knives, Forks & Spoons Press 2019), This Game of Strangers – written with Jane Burn (Wyrd Harvest Press 2017) and Leasungspell (Smokestack 2016).  He lives in Middlesbrough and is a senior lecturer in creative writing at Teesside University.