Apocrypha is available from Donut Press as a special limited edition
of 250 copies, numbered and signed. The wrap-around cover is designed
by Liam Relph; the 16 x 19 cm pamphlet has a plain black cover and is
3-hole stitched. 21 poems, 23 p. Cost £10.

Apocrypha is the Poetry Book Society's pamphlet Choice for Summer 2011.

Click on the thumbnail images below for pictures. Three poems follow.

III

Bed-head Lazarus, at breakfast:
three Embassy Regal, tea so strong
you could trot a mouse on it.

To his bare barrel chest, a rag
embroidered with Do Not Disturb
was butterfly-stitched.

Nettle cheese omelette, French
toast with field mushrooms,
three more furious cigarettes.

Manifest ailments: eye-gum,
heart overrun with Japanese knotweed,
cock not worth a docken.

Mist burned off. Honey bees fussed
religiously, as usual, over roses.

VII

Adam lay miraculous,
unconscious with drink.
In a dream, he named whiskies

by nose, palate, finish:
brine and limes, a delicate
peat-reek, Weetabix.

Plasticine, emulsion paint,
amyl nitrate. A warm horse.
Kippers, treacle toffee, grassy

with green grape …
the work was endless.
Jalapeno peppers, tobacco notes …

Adam rose with a rough tongue
and heartbroken.

XX

Balding, young Noah
constructed a classic comb-over.
High wind signalled ruin,

impending rain. He amassed
articles on follicle health, applied
pigeon dung paste,

pomades of hippopotamus fat,
black Andalusian foal urine.
The more elusive ingredients

took jungle-time and steel traps,
an array of live bait, his life
regime and rumour.

Markets rose. Bullet-head Noah
floated his beauty empire.

A.B. Jackson © 2011