New Times,
New Thinking.

  1. Culture
  2. Poetry
7 December 2022

The NS Poem: A brief note on the interregnum

A new poem by John Burnside.

By John Burnside

There were so many fathers then,
boot-prints running out into the snow
and never coming back, the hum
of elsewhere, every time we stopped
to listen. Someone would say
the city on a hill,
then days would pass in total
silence, unknown bodies
waiting in the dark, that bated
hush along the treeline, where the names
were failing, so it felt like hinterland,
provisional, and never quite
as final as we hoped it might have been,
the way it was in stories: ruin, blossom.

John Burnside is a Scottish author and poet. His most recent poetry collections are “Apostasy” (Dare-Gale) and “Learning to Sleep” (Jonathan Cape)

Read more poetry published in the New Statesman here

Select and enter your email address Your weekly guide to the best writing on ideas, politics, books and culture every Saturday. The best way to sign up for The Saturday Read is via saturdayread.substack.com The New Statesman's quick and essential guide to the news and politics of the day. The best way to sign up for Morning Call is via morningcall.substack.com
Visit our privacy Policy for more information about our services, how Progressive Media Investments may use, process and share your personal data, including information on your rights in respect of your personal data and how you can unsubscribe from future marketing communications.
THANK YOU

Content from our partners
No health, no growth
Tackling cancer waiting times
Kickstarting growth: will complex health issues be ignored?

Topics in this article :

This article appears in the 07 Dec 2022 issue of the New Statesman, Christmas Special