share


Monopoly (after Ashbery)

I keep everything until the moment it’s needed.
I am the glint in your bank manager’s eye.
I never eat cake in case of global meltdown.
I am my own consolation.

I have a troubled relationship with material things:
I drop my coppers smugly in the river.
(I do everything with an unbearable smugness.)
I propose a vote of thanks.

I make small errors in your favour. Sometimes
I pretend nothing is wrong.
I won second prize in a beauty contest.
I am yellowing at the edges.

I was last seen drawing the short straw.
I hang about tragically on street corners, where
I hand out cards that read: if you see
I am struggling to lift this card, please, do not help me.

 

 


ABOUT THE CONTRIBUTOR

is a Hong Kong-born poet and academic. Her first book, Loop of Jade (Chatto & Windus, 2015), won the T.S. Eliot Prize. She teaches poetry at King’s College London.


READ NEXT

fiction

April 2013

Popular Mechanics

Gareth Dickson

fiction

April 2013

In simple terms, the process of combustion creates energy that is converted into motion. The ignition by the spark...

Art

March 2015

Tropenkoller

Lothar Hempel

Art

March 2015

Taking the title Tropenkoller (Tropical Madness), German artist Lothar Hempel’s latest exhibition at Stuart Shave/Modern Art, London (Feb 27-Mar...

poetry

September 2011

The Moon over Timna

Rikudah Potash

TR. Michael Casper

poetry

September 2011

In a copper house Lived the new moon, The new moon Of Timna. In a copper coat With a...

 

Get our newsletter

 

* indicates required