Cardiff International Poetry Competition

Runner-up - Kathryn Simmonds

Kathryn Simmonds was born in Hertfordshire in 1972 and now lives in north London where she works as an editor. Her first poetry collection Sunday at the Skin Launderette was published by Seren in February and her radio play Poetry for Beginners was broadcast on Radio 4 earlier this year. Kathryn also writes short stories.

Sunday Morning

Since I’ve stopped praying
I’ve got so much more done:
the fridge is cleaner, I read more fiction,
the telephone is less often off the hook.
Since I’ve done away with God
I’ve done the bathroom up
and tried a dozen different recipes.

Since I’ve stopped considering the nature
of the soul, the infinite, all that,
I’ve found the joy of gardening,
I garden without thought
for the intricate glory of the Hollyhock.
He’ll find me, if he chooses,
he’ll lift me like a woolly two-year-old,

secure me to the fold. Meanwhile
I’m eating chocolates in bed,
the words of the psalms dissolving like an old dream.
I’m right here with a magazine
- Shock New Pictures, All Your TV Favourites -
the church bells making their distant din,
the duvet warm and comforting,
the tumble dryer just spinning, and spinning.