Mixed Bag

My long(ish) poem Angel Bitch was published yesterday in Beat to a Pulp. You can read it here.

Tip: It contains a poem within a poem. If time is pressing you could skip it go back and read it later!

The Angel and the Sculptor

For months the sculptor had chipped at the rock,
yet no one could make out its form.
When asked, he had said; "It's an image of God!"
but at that they would laugh and wander away,
and the man would chip for another long day.

When at last he could see the end of the task,
when drawing close to the vision he'd seen,
an angel appeared and told him to stop.
He was getting too close to what no one must see -
the faithful reflection of God.

"Imagination is all I use!"
he said to the angel then. But the angel replied
that that in itself, was a perfect image of God.
"I could change it, perhaps..." the sculptor said,
"- if you could suggest what to change?"

"I've no idea," the angel replied, "not having seen
for myself, the force that lies behind the universe,
the multiverse and the things that have always been.
I just have my orders, I'm told what to do,
they pop in my mind, from where I don't know."

The sculptor, frustrated, took his chisel once more,
and hurled it with all of his might. It hit and removed
a great lump of rock. The carving glowed white
before a great flash and a darkness enveloped the earth
and the voice of the multiverse screamed.

---

My Aunt's Purse

My aunt (95) lost her purse earlier this year. She thought she'd dropped it in the road. Many weeks later her friend and neighbour found it. "His" fox, the fox that had taken out squatters' rights on his garden cold frame, had been looking after it for her. It was very chewed, but the money was still intact and the purse had been given pride of place among the fox's collectables: its private papers, old coins, gloves, a handkerchief - and a cardboard cut-out of an angel.

My aunt was so grateful to the fox, she cooked it a special dinner.