Fiona Robyn's first poetry collection

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Living Things is my first poetry collection - the cream of ten years worth of poems. 

I could write about the poems, but I'd rather they spoke for themselves. 

Here are three poems from the collection - a bit of a love poem, one with a small dog called Charlie, and a rude one about jam. 

I hope you like them.

Published by Lulu.com in January 2008 * Available from Amazon at £8.00 / $16.95 *  ISBN 978-1-84799-127-0 * 64 pages

 

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AS THE TRAIN SLOWS AND STOPS

he lifts his head from his wife’s shoulder.
One whole side of his face is deep hot pink,
the clay of his cheek has the basket-weave
pattern of her cardigan pressed into it.
He stretches his way out of sleep,
small noises escaping like moths.
His grown up family are amused.
He scolds them in Spanish, embarrassed,
they only laugh louder.

His wife sits quietly, her eyes full
of what they have forged between them
from a life-time of witnessing the best
and the worst in each other.

She holds him in a look of such love.

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CIRCLE LINE

The pint he’s cupped and savoured all afternoon
mixes with the chattering track and warm, used air.
He leans back, lets his eyes close and his mouth open. 

There’s a mug of sweet tea waiting for him at home,
and a grey dog called Charlie.
He dies quietly between Blackfriars and Temple.
 
It’s fourteen hours before he’s found.
He is thin under his clothes, the men who lift him
put too much strength into their arms.

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JAM

I was asked to put my lips around the tube
that pistoned jam into the hearts of do-nuts.

He had been there longer than any of us,
he knew about bread. He tried his luck

asking every Saturday for a kiss –
he’d only slide his tongue inside my mouth

for a second. I wasn’t ready
but I liked his eyes on me as I stood

at the sink and sucked, sucked so hard my cheeks
ached from the effort, thick gluey jam

suddenly sweet in my mouth. I waited
a second, maybe two. Spat it out.

 

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What people say:

...full of really good things – as well as living ones (and disturbing ones). I am particularly drawn to the simple quiet voice you have in these poems

AF Harrold, author of Of Birds and Bees, The Man Who Spent Years in the Bath and more...

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Loving it, very sharp and focused and sensuous.

Catherine Smith, author of The Butcher's Hands and Lip

Fiona Robyn's first collection of poetry brings together poems which have been published in a variety of magazines from Aesthetica to Rialto. As one would expect it is full of good things, poems inspired by moments of paying attention. My favourites so far are Tortoiseshell Cat and Conker.

Caroline M Davies, Advancing Poetry

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