This week Jenny Pagdin talks about the inexpressible in poetry and her experiences of post-natal psychosis which she explores in her pamphlet Caldbeck.
Here she responds to the poetry prompt set by Jamie Osborn in the first episode to write a poem on borders and intimacy. Please submit your own response to this and other prompts on the podcast here.
Regrets
When I crossed your border
I ought to have held
your language – tactile and direct – on my
unwieldy tongue.
and when I edged
onto your landlocked patch
I should have offered you something for your integrity.
And those nights you lay drifting, permeable,
I ought to have carried you through the crowd of voices
like an untuned radio in the dark.
Jenny Pagdin
Poetry Non-Stop 