Jo Shapcott

This might be wrong on so many levels. I wrote this poem after reading Jo Shapcott's wonderful (that should undo some of the damage to be soon wrought) collection, Of Mutability. The poem simply compares my own approach to poetry - both reading it and writing it - with hers. I recently heard (and saw) her at Foyles in Charing Cross Road reading poems about bees from her new collection. I really look forward to meeting her - which I will (unless this makes her cross) in February at a Faber & Faber workshop. Enough already! Here's the poem:

Jo Shapcott

My thoughts run on rails
to timetables, destinations;
not like yours, on breezes,
honeycombs and seasons;

and when we talk, as we will,
of setting out and catching the drift
of filling our nets with flying fish
will my flesh begin to peel?

and at the end of the line
will I still double back
while you run on, denying
a need to dally even for breath?


(c) Poetrivia