bending toward the light

For Emilie Collyer

the poet who is not the poet but is reading someone else’s poetry despite being a poet in their own right is bent over on the stage that is actually a staircase or perhaps a stairwell not bent over exactly but rather bending toward the light (or is the light bending toward them?) so that they might read or recite or remember the poem that is a piece of a collection or a part of the collaboration that is not their own but is someone else’s or perhaps it’s a translation of a poem that is not their own and even the poetry reader who is actually a poetry lover who is actually a poetry editor who is actually a person of significance in the world of poetry but of course is totally done with poetry because poetry is done with itself cannot stand to listen or cannot handle standing or is holding their tongue stand-still as if still holding themself upright or simply just holding their bladder. 

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Tim Loveday is a poet and baby academic. He won the 2022 and 2024 Dorothy Porter Prize for Poetry, the 2025 Calanthe Collective Prize for Unpublished Poetry and the 2023 Venie Holmgren Environmental Poetry Award. He is the poetry editor at Island magazine. More: timloveday.com.