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2015 MELITA HUME POETRY PRIZE SHORTLIST FOCUS: MICHAEL CONLEY


A TEACHER FROM MANCHESTER AND A POET
Michael Conley is a 30-year-old teacher from Manchester.  He has been published in a variety of magazines including Magma, Rialto, Interpreters House and Bare Fiction.  His first pamphlet, Aquarium, was published by Flarestack in 2014. The poem here below is from his shortlisted collection for the Melita Hume Poetry Prize 2015.
 
We Discover A Severed Thumb In The Woods
 
Lying either side of it,
we play
who dares get their tongue closest.
 
It nestles
in a pile of wet leaves, real
as a joke thumb. 
 
It mightn't be a thumb after all;
could be a stubby finger.
It's hard to tell
 
without the context of a hand.
It smells like
the thing you can’t find
 
in the fridge.
You are winning: your tongue
is practically touching it.
 
 
poem copyright the author 2015.
 
 



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