Letters page

The furious newsagent blinks,
Steps out, in the sunlit street.
A whistling rounds his corner,
Unstudied, raucous and sweet.

"You're going the long way round!
I've had three complaints today."
The paperboy's round face grows carefully blank.
"I was just passing this way- "

A scientist writes to the paper
(Which jogs in the dark of the bag)
"There may not have been an explosion
Which shook all of space like a rag.

No, atoms fell into a pattern,
Repeated, as dark follows day" -
The whistling ducks under the lime buds -
Life was just passing this way.

Alison Brackenbury

If you've any comments on this poem, Alison Brackenbury would be pleased to hear from you.