Two Poems by Marc Chamberlain

Not-husband

More than streetlight
boyfriend        more than the city, babe

it is the name of no poetry

the tutorious name        you’d centre
to silence me, how

could my husband treat me this way.

Then throw        the glass        the chair
the vase        my friend Oleg gave us

on our big day        to the wall.

Years later        sleepless in bed
I hear the clang

of someone’s security gate downstairs

think of the things you left
for almost a year

the key I let you keep        I can’t explain why.

Grit

Beyond the Forest Marble were Greensand
Cornbrash           Fuller’s Earth

Ice cubes           crystal           cocaine
on the deep set sill

the pane a mirror           a man’s hands behind me

Black Rock           Gault
strips and pockets of Frome Clay

I was told           put your tongue here

At the edge of the Mendips           were Oolite for freestone
the base of a seam

of Oxford Clay

for roads           fletton bricks           London

Marc Chamberlain’s poetry has been published in titles including The Hudson Review, Magma, The Mechanics’ Institute Review and The Best New British and Irish Poets 2019-2021. His poetry criticism has been published in The Times Literary Supplement. He is a PhD candidate in Creative Writing (Poetry) at Durham University, working towards his first collection and writing a critical thesis on the poetry of John Wieners.