to start again from listening. a colleague's thin shirt gaping lightly at the buttons - not because he's fat but because it needs an iron. saying I would let that poem lie for a year and then violently strip it - no not him saying that, me saying that, not to him, to a friend on email. or just until you can get its wildness. but if you write like me you'll hardly write anything. every day every day. leaving out the Matron saying 'constipation! one, one, one, one, one, like rabbit droppings!' which would have been the best part. 

our sewage pipe got so full of tree roots that the toilet was constantly blocking. and then the whole garden got dug up, and now it's grown over with grass again but the soil is hard clay and uneven and T fell over yesterday morning and has a Strawberry Shortcake sticking plaster on his face. 

I fall asleep with him most nights, often in my work clothes. try to brush my teeth first just in case. be there soon. 

and what is in the day? a couple of hours reading an honours thesis on the balcony in the brilliant sun, above the other childcare centre, above the elm tree, burning hot in the sun but I really long for it on my skin which feels too cool in the shade when I've forgotten my cardigan. feet up on a decaying wicker chair. the male childcare teacher roaring at the kiddies like a pirate or a monster and they giggle. a union meeting with lists on the paper stuck to the whiteboard. the union rep's painful hip, their need to explain to me, the last one left in the room.  

emails from anxious colleagues and being surprised to find there are things I just don't care about any more, things I won't wind up about. 

a couple of hours talking about Japanese poetry - planning a reading tour, talking through a translation. just two lines to refine on this one now - trying to avoid the 'cry/die' rhyme which comes very easily towards the end but which doesn't catch its weight. 'soon a newborn will cry' but it's more like 'soon the cry of a newborn will sound', which is unnecessary. 'and then someone will die' but it's more like 'and therefore someone is going to become dead'.

the months of silence the list of deadlines sailing past me. 

the sector was not too happy about that. 

bellowing dust

Dear Huma, 

You know, don't you, that if you and Bette Middler starred in something now it'd only get called Biatches? Don't blame you but don't think I ever loved you. The number of times you resigned to be replaced by three full-timers. 

 The mine’s blue eye emptied twenty years ago. We stayed. We married. We climbed into the cabs of our separate machines, & in the black sand socket began to dig. The steam – it looks like steam, peeling off a black cup – is dryer than smoke. We watch it all day. For breaks Jasmine rolls the darts and rattles her lungs at me. My lungs rattle back.  There’s no one else.

The thirtieth of twenty-nine empty dorms is ours. We use the seventh of six closed docks. The thirteenth of twelve sunk barges takes our work. 

When the managers left we unbolted a canteen table, and ever since we’ve eaten where we like. Last month I pierced, at last, the sea-side wall of the open pit. And now we see the ocean while we work. 

what can I do for my sisters? schedule in an honest conversation, like holiday poetry, or take it when the toddler's driving the van & we're hanging either side of the open door - tent flaps - tap runs - our annual ten minutes - hey I love you I don't want him to punch you - beep beep we're here! now everybody get on board! 

The video opens on a living room where two black women in black and white uniforms, with white aprons and caps, hold the arms of a naked white woman, labouring. The living room is spacious, with large garden windows and a settee in the centre. The carpet is covered, wall to wall, with newspaper. A white man in brown trousers and cardigan stands nearby. When the baby emerges the video ends. We drink chrysanthemum tea from waxed paper boxes. On the bus shelter outside is a single scrawled graffito: "Singapore good." You must be careful, says Matron, not to listen to your mother-in-law. If she tells you must not shower, must not use aircon, must not open the window. You must. She can tell us about infected breasts, the smell. Meat left in the car. Infected stitches under unchanged dressings. Babies thrown from apartment windows. Fate. A baby born without a skull. Fate already before you open your eyes. They come from China, and that is why. Now we have exercises. I feel pale. Purva leans against the wall instead of her husband, who is not here. Some part of the demonstration does not apply.