David Hanlon

by David Hanlon

Yes, I’m in my head all day again.
It’s cold in here—arctic, even.
Every inward road looks identical,
erased beneath unbroken ice.

That’s why I’m shaking.
Any stranger I pass
in my heavy, mud-dark duffle coat
along these color-drained streets
assumes it’s only the leaves
arguing with the wind—
not this inner frost
cracking my bones.

Later, at home, in my too-quiet room,
legs stretched out before me
like split timbers,
I register my old white socks
peeking through the holes
of navy Crocs—

each one a snowdrop,
each one a thought
that survived the freeze.

David Hanlon is a Pushcart-nominated poet based in Cardiff, Wales. His work appears in numerous magazines and journals, including Rust & Moth, Anthropocene, and Trampset. His latest collection, Dawn’s Incision, was published by Icefloe Press. You can follow him on Twitter @davidhanlon13 and Instagram @hanlon6944. 

by David Hanlon

Obligation: an ocean bubbling & boiling in a kettle.
I make trillions of cups of tea from it,
spend my life boiling & pouring & containing,
then slump & cancel all my plans for the following day.
Spend the evening scrolling the evening
for messages, for contact: my inbox full
of junk with no delete forever button,
the earth a period on a map of our solar system,
my heart: flat as the surface of a map, empty as outer space.

I fold it into an envelope, into the shape of
this yellow horned poppy in my garden:
the one I watch grow & grow &
grow until I taste my own tea, until I remember
that sunlight & rain are love in different forms,
until my hands rest like two seals on a shore,
their nearby ocean my cup of tea: mollified,
& in my summered chest a letter,
a message blooming.

David Hanlon is a poet from Cardiff, Wales. You can find his work in many magazines and journals, including Rust & Moth, The Lumiere Review & trampset. His first full-length collection Dawn’s Incision is available from Icefloe Press. You can follow him on twitter @davidhanlon13 & Instagram @hanlon6944.

by David Hanlon

You’re eight hours of sleep & careful folding;
I’m a mouthful of ulcers & grasping at hours
lost to obligation,
lost to obsession.

You’re made of granite & marble,
made for building;
you make

sheet music of my skin,
exhume a melody in me.

I’m chalk & sandstone,
used in paint;

I’m weak
because life runs through me.

I’ll move, I’ll go
wherever it takes me—

I’ll still
hold your hand,

sing my song,
brushstroke

our existence.

David Hanlon is a poet from Cardiff, Wales. He is a Best of the Net nominee. You can find his work online in over 60 magazines, including Rust & Moth, ONE ART & Homology Lit. His first chapbook Spectrum of Flight is available for purchase now at Animal Heart Press. You can follow him on twitter @davidhanlon13 and Instagram @welshpoetd.