Laura Varnam
Medieval Mystic Margery Kempe in Tesco
.
Of course she’s one of those shoppers
who thinks she won’t need a trolley but
halfway round her basket’s on the lino and
she’s losing tins of custard powder &
baby formula and she’s crushing the body
& blood of Christ under her arm while
John Junior tucks into a doughnut she
hasn’t paid for yet and there’s an
unexpected item in the bagging area and
it’s Christ again wanting to talk about his
glory and she just wants to get home and
putthe kids in front of CBeebies to keep
them occupied before He starts on about
how lonely it is in heaven. She clutches a
multipack of paper towel and its
whiteness gives her hope.
.
.
.
Laura Varnam is one of the three winners of the Nine Arches Press Primers competition 2023 and a selection of her poems will be published in Primers Volume 7 (August 2024). Her poems have been published in journals including Bad Lilies, Banshee Lit, Berlin Lit, MIR Online, Osmosis Press, and Wet Grain; the Gods & Monsters anthology (ed Ana Sampson); and with creative-critical essays in Annie journal and Postmedieval. She has poems forthcoming in Dust Poetry and Under the Radar.
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