On Sunday we had the pleasure of reading with Malene Engelund. She is a Danish poet living in London and currently studying for an MA in creative writing at Royal Holloway. Here is a poem of hers recommended by a friend
Roof by Malene Engelund
After his father dies, he slips off his grief
like a wet coat and becomes a fury of carpentry,
binding wood to wood as if grafting his heart
back together the way he would the split stem
of an apple tree.
By the second week his hands are gloved
in splinters, small landmarks mapping his loss
across palms and fingers. Then he moves
to the roof, replacing its faded grass cover
as they had done five years earlier.
I watch him work it alone, the sharp
North Sea wind drawing salt from his eyes:
My father, placing down each slab of soil
onto the grey tarpaulin, preparing the earth,
burying his father with every seed he sows.