good morning.
when were you born?
there are many names
registered here. how many
names do you have?
as you say. did you wake
well?
i was born in the afternoon.
well, thank god i am not
nameless.
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‘I want the poem to destroy time. / What are the ceremonies of forgetting?’
An elegy by Nick Laird for his father, Alastair Laird, who died in 2021 of Covid-19. Shortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best Single Poem.
‘In the place where I grew up there were horses, thighs moving like nudity under their fur’
From Amnion by Stephanie Sy-Quia, published by Granta Books and shortlisted for the Felix Dennis Prize for Best First Collection.
‘My brother and I hurried through sloppy postures of praise, quiet as the light pooling around us.’
A poem by Kaveh Akbar, from his shortlisted collection Pilgrim Bell, first published in Granta 156: Interiors.
‘I wanted to and then / Remembered why I want to never’
Poetry by Shane McCrae, shortlisted for Cain Named the Animal.
‘Would / the apple be concerned / if I said it was not an apple’
Poems by Padraig Regan, from Some Integrity, shortlisted for the Felix Dennis Prize for Best First Collection.
‘Empires fall like milk teeth.’
Stephanie Sy-Quia on her collection Amnion.
‘Careful when you turn your eyes towards someone, you allow them the chance to turn theirs on you.’
Tice Cin on her debut novel Keeping the House.
‘create a national holiday in your namelessness, in my head.’
Poems from the author’s debut collection Quiet.
‘He twists biblical spliffs. / Curtains warble in the television light.’ Two poems by Collin Callahan.
The authors of Flèche and physical discuss the state of queer poetry in Britain, how to make poetry alive and what an anthology can mean.
‘For all its flimsiness, the cage takes itself terribly seriously, restricting access, glorying in the name of Fatherland.’
