Changing carriages at Birmingham New Street

Introduction and sample poem to what likely will be my final full length poetry book

Changing carriages at Birmingham New Street unless plans change over the next few months will be my final full-length book of poetry which will be out over autumn or winter 2023.

Began in 2017 during the creation of my third book “The Birth of Autumn” which then life on its own afterwards, its contents will tell you the story through a series of memories told by an unnamed narrator of firstly of a friendship he had growing up with a girl called Sarah who came back into his life after over a twenty-year gap with the pair of them in deeply unhappy marriages changing everything forever.

Inspired by the clarify in Hugo Williams's book dock leaves and the expressive nature of Paul Auster’s poetry, this book will take the reader on a series of journeys up and down the northwest of England and beyond using their adventures in towns and cities to show how everything changes often without realising.

The piece I am going to share is a piece earlier in the book, the title piece itself which will show the movement and the adventures that the couple in question shared in this book.

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Changing carriages at Birmingham New Street

During those early days of course

we had to keep it quiet

whether I was stopping at the Malmaison in Leeds

and you lied about a new client in Horsforth

which went on all night,

and how about that time at Birmingham New Street

when the train broke down

halfway back from Euston

and we ended up sitting in separate carriages

when your husband came to get you.

Do you remember Warwick Castle, Sarah

and Manchester United before that Champions League match

where we could only chat for five minutes

at the beer counter during half time

to prevent anybody from becoming suspicious,

and the return leg two weeks later in Madrid

which I had to cancel last minute

when one of my girls went down ill

just before I was due to leave

and I ended up spending the night in hospital

Courting our guilt in ways we didn't realise

from an almost nervous beginning

when we were reconnecting our friends

clicking open our hearts like suitcases

lock after lock after lock,

sitting on steps outside Manchester Piccadilly train Station

every time we met sweeping everything else aside

under an imaginary table

openmouthed in sorries

each time we kissed to start with.