The swing was picked up for the boys,
for the here-and-here-to-stay
and only she knew why it was
I dug so solemnly


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The swing was picked up for the boys,
for the here-and-here-to-stay
and only she knew why it was
I dug so solemnly
Sign in to Granta.com.
‘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.
Don Paterson works as a poetry editor and as a jazz guitarist, and lectures in creative writing at the University of St Andrews. In 2003 his poetry collection Landing Light won the Whitbread Poetry Prize and the T.S. Eliot Prize. He is the author of several other poetry collections, including Rain, Orpheus and 40 Sonnets.
More about the author →‘The beasts of the forest drove me out. / The villagers barred their doors. / The gods turned the page.’
Don Paterson reads his poem, ‘The Self-Illuminated’ in memoriam Peter Porter, from Granta 119: Britain.
‘One, perhaps his psalter, / the other, a manuscript, or a portable altar.’
‘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.
‘Tad took down any picture of Mam the week after she died. He said they would bring bad luck to the house.’
A story set in rural Wales.
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