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15th December, 2023

Friday Poem – ‘The Crux’ by Vanessa Lampert

Black and white photo of an empty path

This week’s Friday Poem is ‘The Crux’ by Vanessa Lampert from her debut collection Say it With Me. We recently interviewed Vanessa about the book on The Seren Poetry Podcast. Listen & subscribe on your favourite podcast app.

The Crux
Through layers of Christmas 
you come back to haunt us, 
the sink’s greasy burden 
unmanned by your absence, 
the turkey more lunged at 
than carved. How many years 
since you ended it, eleven? 
My mind’s eye has you restless 
as you were. Muscular and lean 
as a much younger man 
thanks to all that running, 
which, as it turned out 
was away. You left us to guess 
what hell it was 
that hunted you. That’s the crux 
of what’s haunting us now.