stdClass Object ( [ID] => 20716 [post_author] => 18 [post_date] => 2020-03-26 16:09:56 [post_date_gmt] => 2020-03-26 16:09:56 [post_content] => my son lies asleep in a tin sandwich box inside the knapsack of a man deep within the Cayuga salt mine’s corridor of teeth where there’s the sound of what in my son’s dreams he takes to be our neighbour’s cough but means, in fact, they’re blasting new seams in the caverns beneath the man who now, ravenous, peels the misted clingfilm and only slightly surprised to find the naked child – limbs folded, neat as travel cutlery – thinks whoever let their son be wrapped up for a stranger’s lunch does not deserve to keep him, crunching down on the still-soft bones and it is only as I hear the man’s involuntary noises of pleasure rising from far beneath the earth that I remember no, my son is in the back seat and that is just the sound of him snoring, head loose on his neck, terribly alive, as the wheels of the car on the salted tarmac deliver us both to soft play. [post_title] => Due to a series of ill judgements on my part [post_excerpt] => [post_status] => publish [comment_status] => closed [ping_status] => closed [post_password] => [post_name] => due-to-a-series-of-ill-judgements-on-my-part [to_ping] => [pinged] => [post_modified] => 2020-03-26 20:02:47 [post_modified_gmt] => 2020-03-26 20:02:47 [post_content_filtered] => [post_parent] => 0 [guid] => http://poems.poetrysociety.org.uk/?post_type=poems&p=20716 [menu_order] => 0 [post_type] => poems [post_mime_type] => [comment_count] => 0 [filter] => raw [meta_data] => stdClass Object ( [wpcf-published-in] => [wpcf-date-published] => 2019 [wpcf-summary-description] => 'Due to a series of ill judgements on my part' was commended in the 2019 National Poetry Competition. National Poetry Competition.

From the judges: "This is surrealism at its best - the fears the narrator expresses and the journey we're taken on feel utterly real. Memorable, startling, suffused with dark and urgent humour, this was a poem we returned to and marvelled at, again and again. " [wpcf-rights-information] => [wpcf-poem-award] => Commended, National Poetry Competition 2019 [wpcf_pr_belongs] => ) [poet_data] => stdClass Object ( [ID] => 20769 [forename] => [surname] => [title] => Joe Dunthorne [slug] => joe-dunthorne [content] => Joe Dunthorne was born and grew up in Swansea. His first novel, Submarine, won the Curtis Brown Award and was translated into twenty languages. His second, Wild Abandon, won the Encore Prize. His latest is The Adulterants. His first collection of poems, O Positive, was published last year by Faber & Faber. He lives in London. ) )

my son lies asleep in a tin sandwich box
inside the knapsack of a man
deep within the Cayuga salt mine’s
corridor of teeth where there’s the sound of what
in my son’s dreams he takes to be
our neighbour’s cough but means, in fact,
they’re blasting new seams in the caverns
beneath the man who now, ravenous,
peels the misted clingfilm and only slightly surprised
to find the naked child – limbs folded, neat
as travel cutlery – thinks whoever let their son
be wrapped up for a stranger’s lunch
does not deserve to keep him, crunching down
on the still-soft bones and it is only as I hear
the man’s involuntary noises of pleasure
rising from far beneath the earth that I remember
no, my son is in the back seat
and that is just the sound of him snoring, head loose
on his neck, terribly alive, as the wheels
of the car on the salted tarmac
deliver us both to soft play.