Medlars by Stephen Bone

 


Stephen Bone’s work has appeared in various journals in the U.K. and the U.S., and in numerous anthologies.

His first collection In the Cinema (Playdead Press) was published in 2014 and a pamphlet Plainsong (Indigo Dreams) was published in 2018.

 

 

 

             

             

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

           

 

 

Medlars

 

 

 

From the cupboard under your stairs

you pick one from its tray.

A sort of apple, open-ended,

on the turn.

 

Try, you urge, a spoon waved

like a hypnotist’s chain. Reluctantly,

a child braced for medicine I open up

to be fed a scoop of decay.

 

Good ? You ask, moist rot melting

to the cusp of sweetness. I tremble a nod

as you slough off your snakeskin boots;

coil yourself into a chair.

 

Stephen Bone

 

First published in The Interpreter’s House

 

Ode to a Giant Waterlily by Stephen Bone

Sundews by Stephen Bone

Stories

Poems