Steve Ely

Lightweight Thor, struggling to finishhis pint, outwrestled by the cat. Off fishingwith Hymir for flatties and sperm whales.Hymir picking brandlings from the trickling filter.Thor lopping an ox-head in the cow-pat field.They lowered their rods in the abyssopelagic,opposite peg 88. Hymir, bored, nowt biting.Thor looks across, excited – feels like he’s gotsummat on. Churning water,...

Two brothers, Ad and Rude olfDassler. Best götzendämmerungtraining shoes in the wholeof the Teutoberg Forest, as wornby Owens and Luz – oh, the brownand the yellow ale! Hide Hickler!de Nazification, de fraternization,de rise of FIFA and de IOC.Canaan able, Puma, La MarqueAux 3 Bandes. King – Pele, Cruyff,Maradona. Copas – Franz, Michel,Zizou. In a twist of fate, the...

The bayonet tip wouldn’t bite at first. Scraped, slid off, like his vest was made of mithril. Lothlorien, Gonvilnd Keys. A gift from the Lady, or Arron Banks. Barings Bank. The plunderous karats of Antwerpus Loup. The bayonet tip wunt bite in the thick-seamed ephod, its armour of urin and bummin. Deep bruzing, dribling facets. Sum wailing: Paedo/haemo-philiac sadness. Bayonet tip at...

At bay in wounded country, panting across the loping snowfield for sanctuary of pines. Hounds bungling the line through folds of worried sheep, discharge of oaths and anxious shotguns barking off the trail. Torn throats and sucked blood: constables, collaborators, conscripts and their whores. From disembowelled cottage to massacred farmyard, the identikit’s identical: bristling...

Holy Mary grant me

a firkin of butter               a peck of green pease a quart of oysters               a kenning of corn

one thousand from the...