The below poem is taken from William Wootten’s new pamphlet, Looking at the Horsemen, published by New Walk Editions on 4th May. On the same day, it will be launched online in a co-launch with Lisa Kelly. For more information and to register to attend, click here.
Reading Walter de la Mare, William’s annotated selection of de la Mare’s poems, will be published by Faber & Faber on 17th June.
Talking at Breakfast
We have woken in a former century To poised rooms and the sense that we are guests here Where the sizzlings of bacon and large mugs of tea Are filling up the kitchen with an air Tasting of homeliness. Our hosts have brought The paper from the mat, and we can stare At long familiar headlines, being caught In history where nothing we can do Can change what happens next, and while we ought To tell them what we know will soon come true, It is as yet too early in the day For making conversation, so we chew On through our breakfast, marvelling at the way They can behave as if there were no more The matter with their lives than there is in grey Box brownie photographs time will store Up in the loft. Sun flashes from the roofslates And a new-washed day is stretching out before Us to enjoy when we have cleared the plates.