South Coast Poets Out Loud

A list of lists by Steve Meyrick

The South Coast Writers Centre Season 6 Episode 22

Steve Meyrick reads his poem 'A list of lists'

This poem appears in 34-37 Degrees South 2025 - An Anthology of Poetry from members of the South Coast Writers Centre. 


Fresh words brought to you by the South Coast Writers Centre

 

A List of Lists by Stephen Meyrick

 

A sequence—a catalogue or roll of things,

brought together for a purpose, or by chance.

 

A ship careening, capsize imminent—

the danger and the thrill of risking all.

 

A place for jousting, for knightly tournament

where skill and strength determined right.

 

A hem, the border of a garment, a strip

cut from different cloth—always on the edge.

 

An unsettling ambivalence: sometimes 

the topmost rail, sometimes the column’s lowest part.

 

To cut away the sapwood, trim the waste:

who makes the choice of who gets left behind?

 

A half-rhyme, then—a lust; an inclination

or desire, an appetite unsatisfied. A shame.

 

And, once upon a time, a scar or wound,

an injury half-healed, a pain preserved.