Todd Swift is a tutor with The Poetry School, and Lecturer in Creative Writing at Kingston University. Poems of his have appeared in The Guardian, Poetry (Chicago), Poetry London, and Poetry Review. He is the author of six poetry collections, most recently Seaway: New and Selected Poems (Salmon, 2008) and Mainstream Love Hotel (Tall-lighthouse, 2009). He is co-editor of Modern Canadian Poets: An Anthology, from Carcanet (2010). His blog is Eyewear.
Hunting Party
A heart is sacred, a wounded hart;
Outrun the symbol in the wood.
Pluck out the arrows. The head
Enters after having been shot through
The air, in order to hunt and halt
The glorious animal that will be eaten;
Flesh parts from pelt; horns rise on walls.
The hall hums with music’s knowing.
This is the festival in the glade,
The pump-pump of the love brigade,
That process known as seasonal,
Twirl from rose to worm, grass to spade.
I was very lovely then, fragile,
Bone china, a fine line, a tree
Telling time to be pretty; in love —
The young came to my shop, contoured
In ways that remind desire to break
Open; as spring does; as do flames.
Their names have disappeared — did they
Have any? Their shapes are here
Pressed within a range of cold materials.
© 2011
Salt Publishing Limited 