Familiarity by Nigel Pearce

Arts Richmond

Online - 29 September 2020

When the old lady moved, among other odds and ends

she left her household gods behind.

Cranky and racked with emphysema

they lingered in cracks in plaster

and, resentful of abandonment,

as ill-scented patches in the wainscot;

or squatted over lamps that cast a cheerless light.

Seasons came and passed.

A Lar Familiaris settled in the hearth;

music from the kettle drew a spirit

of the storeroom in from autumn mists.

Caught in vernal cobwebs

the old gods shrank from foreign homeliness

and faded from dank corners with a sigh.

from ABOUT TIME, the 2019 anthology of shortlisted entries from The Roger McGough Poetry Prize. Copies of this Anthology can be purchased for £5 including P&P from Arts Richmond.