share


Monopoly (after Ashbery)

I keep everything until the moment it’s needed.
I am the glint in your bank manager’s eye.
I never eat cake in case of global meltdown.
I am my own consolation.

I have a troubled relationship with material things:
I drop my coppers smugly in the river.
(I do everything with an unbearable smugness.)
I propose a vote of thanks.

I make small errors in your favour. Sometimes
I pretend nothing is wrong.
I won second prize in a beauty contest.
I am yellowing at the edges.

I was last seen drawing the short straw.
I hang about tragically on street corners, where
I hand out cards that read: if you see
I am struggling to lift this card, please, do not help me.

 

 


ABOUT THE CONTRIBUTOR

is a Hong Kong-born poet and academic. Her first book, Loop of Jade (Chatto & Windus, 2015), won the T.S. Eliot Prize. She teaches poetry at King’s College London.


READ NEXT

fiction

May 2012

Hunt for American Heiress Continues...

Seraphina Madsen

fiction

May 2012

Hunt for American Heiress Continues With Bizarre Manuscript Found in Cave in Altamira By ALICE SHIFT 7:00 AM ET...

Interview

February 2014

Interview with Patrick Keiller

David Anderson

Interview

February 2014

Patrick Keiller, an architect ‘diverted’ into making films, is principally known for his Robinson series, which began with  London (1994)...

fiction

March 2015

Wedding Watcher

Helle Helle

TR. Martin Aitken

fiction

March 2015

I strayed into the church on an impulse. It was a mistake to get off the bus in the...

 

Get our newsletter

 

* indicates required