Latest Poem

My Bench

Not on the tarmac esplanade

Where the proudest benches tout.

Nor facing the rising or setting suns  –

It needs no glory from light’s posturing.

Not varnished annually  –

Its grain is weathered truth.

Overgrown, uncatalogued,

It hosts no remembrance spray,

Save the blossom fall

In sadness and in triumph.

Sit away from faster paths.

Under this unpruned bower

The world in shaded silence

Unfolds itself around you.

Stuart Larner

republished from Every Day Poets

New Year Book sale 

 January sales   $0.99 

starts Dec31st.  

Must end  Jan 7th.   

Hurry. 

Hope

Poem:

6th November

This morning my son and I

searched the lane for fallen rockets.

We found only one:

 a charred remnant amongst sodden leaves

run over by a car.

'Obviously a dud,' I said, 'burnt out

before it had even reached those trees.'

'No Dad,' he said.

'This fell back to earth

after it had scorched the stars.'

Stuart Larner

(earlier version first published disguised in prose on the letters page Scarborough Evening News , 10/11/08).

my new book, written under the nom-de-plume Rosy Stewart. co-authored with Rosie Larner.

Hope: Stories from a Women's Refuge

The story of three women who track down perpetrators of domestic violence. A series of their cases.

Comfort Regained

I found my old Teddy in a cupboard,
A cross stitched over where each eye once lay.
His mouth is sewn into a smile so broad
As though he’d still have soothing things to say.

His ear hangs off as if he’s strained so long
And worn it out listening all those years.
Time’s washed us both: I’ve grown, he’s shrunk, among
The tumble-turnings of my adult cares.

Feel his fur. Comforting is his soft art.
Still the same cuddly stuffing all way through.
Against my cheek I think I hear his heart.
You hold him. Listen. You might hear him too.

Stuart Larner

first published by Every Day Poets

New Book!

The Car 

Republished in a new illustrated edition after 21 years.

A series of twenty-eight Shakespearean sonnets describing the human condition in terms of the workings of a motor car.

An owner’s workshop manual for servicing your life.

My Canine Excuse

Walking the dog at night,

the realms of scent and sight

flow from this lamppost and your house.

There’s freshly-coded news to sniff,

and a curtain only partly-drawn

shows me your light-blue TV world.

Suddenly you look out –

we see each other

like photographers caught in each other’s picture.

A world opens on this moment,

so huge its power rushes down the leash and

tugs me to your door.

Stuart Larner

(first published Every Day Poets).

first published, as a delicious meal of poetry on EveryDay Poets:

The Five Course Reunion 

i)

The melon crescents were served

Back to back like a frown.

When ours were collected afterwards 

They had been turned over into a smile.

ii)

The soup darkens as we stir,

Reds and greens arise then sink.

The stop and go of us these years.

Boundaries split, natures mix. Catch

Them in our spoons, rediscover

The recipe for what we were.

iii)

Choose a wing with me.

If they are from the same bird

It will fly again .

  

iv)

Let's halve this Emmental, you said,

Though in our hands at first

The cheese knife curved away

Nervous at slicing so deep into

Fermented joys we'd sealed up tight.

But then we saw ourselves,

Heart valves, moon craters,

Half-formed question marks,

Caverns echoing our answer.

v)

After so long you`ve opened it again

To seek some biscuit bits,

Edges smoothed in the jostling jar.

Once fresh with flavour at first snap,

Now old and soft and taking on

The crumbs of ones they`re kept with.

Like you and me, a match can`t now exactly be

Rejoined at where it broke, the art is to agree

Two pieces can taste about the same.

Stuart Larner

This poem, originally published on Every Day Poets, takes its inspiration from a 1931 creative map (produced by artist Edward Bawden) which now hangs in Scarborough Library.

Looking at a Print of Scarborough

This picture reminds me of the smell

of seaweed in cliff gardens at low tide,

when sunshine felt like a warm new suit all over,

and the open-top bus ride tousled our hair.

On the beach, eating ice creams,

we stared deep into donkeys’ eyes

to see their souls, sure they sensed ours

in the quiet tide beneath everything.

Lying on our stomachs, watching the sea,

I kept you safe like the castle keeps safe

its bay with rocky shoulder and encircling arm.

I touch the glass that separates the print from me.

There’s a slim airspace between today and yesterday.

I know I can always reach you there.

Stuart Larner

Another previously published poem.

Map Reading

“This is where we started from,” you say.

A feeble line, on uncertain ground,

Wispy as your hair once on my coat.

“This is where we think we went,” you say.

A wavering contour took us round

And back – though no higher, yet so close.

“This is where we meet again,” you say.

Looking for pointers is how we found

Each other, when thinking we were lost.

Stuart Larner

first published Kansas City Voices (Volume 10),2012

In acknowledgement of the Rio Olympics,
a poem reprinted from EDP magazine:

Pool Lifeguard

From my high chair I watch them

splash and kick, push and drift.

That’s how they measure progress here.

A passer-by might often think

my life is sunshades and casual cotton.

But swimmers know my legs

are bared for instant rescue.

My whistle halts their risky tricks:

I can save lives without moving,

but, surprised, they freeze as if I’d killed them.

Stuart Larner

another poem reprinted from the 

Every Day Poets website

Invitation to the Dance

Our words drown in disco sound.

All week this beat had leaked

from loose earphones on rush-hour trains.

Tonight you fluoresce. In strobing light I see

parts of your self you’ve brought from home:

keepsakes from the past,

keys to the present,

charms for the future.

All piled here between us.

May I dance with you round the bag?

Stuart Larner

my new book, written under the nom-de-plume Rosy Stewart. co-authored with Rosie Larner.

Hope: Stories from a Women's Refuge

The story of three women who track down perpetrators of domestic violence. A series of their cases.

The Shop That Isn't There

‘Next to my barber’s, was there a matchbox seller’s?’

‘Oh no,’ she said. ‘That was the tripe-dresser’s.

The other side sold extreme umbrellas,

Two doors down from the laundry-presser’s.’

‘But wasn’t my short-back-and-sider’s once there,

Amongst that row that has been pulled down?’

‘Not quite,’ she said. ‘It was ladies underwear –

This barber’s of yours was in another town.

Remember where you bought the sugar cutters?

That roof’s come down, the shop’s in wrecks.

Superstore now, once a fruit and nutter’s,

Whilst ladies’ and gents’ turned to unisex.’

So I won’t worry over what’s lost and gone

When I’m not sure what was there on day one.

Stuart Larner

previously published on Every Day Poets

Courtship by an Equilibrist

Is your love life sometimes like walking a tightrope stretched out in public view?

poem published by Every day poets in 2013

Courtship by an Equilibrist

A secret street performer,

Without coin-inviting cap or sign.

You can’t see me. You don’t know yet

That I’m here, the balancer in your life.

Zephyr amongst the crowd, I launch

Soap bubbles which float unseen

To pop their good luck on you.

Did you feel that touch on your arm?

When all your traffic lights were green

And your phone calls went through – 

That was due to my juggling with

The junction boxes of your days.

Soon you’ll spot me in your thoughts:

No longer an act, I’ll be risking it all.

There’s danger in the next steps on the line.

Hold tight that line. Don’t let me fall.

Stuart Larner

Seaside Earthquake

Sick of what’s called progress, Earth opened up its shell,

And street cameras, clamps and wardens slithered into hell.

The exorbitant super-loos, the supersonic tucker,

All plastic kissed away with Earth’s tectonic pucker.

The ground feasted fully – topped with a cop car relish –

Then burped up its previous meal, seismically squeamish.

Back came old-style fish and chips, street-sellers’ stirring calls,

Sandcastles with ancient flags, well-tempered herring gulls.

You ask – what of today’s things left deep inside the earth?

They’ll fetch up in the future as tomorrow’s things of worth.

Stuart Larner

This poem was first published by Everydaypoets.com 2014

 fantastic drama at Scarborough

My new play, "How My Partner Killed Me" was given a much appreciated public reading at Script York on Monday 9th May.2016.
It is a black comedy set in a luxury holiday resort in Thailand, and involves apparent murder and blackmail.

out today!

my new book, written under the nom-de-plume Rosy Stewart. co-authored with Rosie Larner.


Hope: Stories from a Women's Refuge

The story of three women who track down perpetrators of domestic violence. A series of their cases.