Winner of The Letter Review Prize for Poetry
Winter 2023
The hirsute man sits
in the jeweller’s doorway.
The dishevelled dog,
a constant by his side.
Passers-by
avert their eyes
except one
uniformed stranger.
He walks towards them
with concerned dismay,
crouches to talk,
takes the dog away.
Colette Lawlor is a biologist who teaches adults and lives on Morecambe Bay, UK. Since her MA at Lancaster University (2009) she has facilitated many community creative writing workshops and courses. Her poems have appeared in magazines such as electric acorn, Mslexia, The Hopper, The Oklahoma Review, Southlight, and been placed in competitions including writersinc., Aesthetica, The Westmorland Gazette, LoveinArt. Her novel was longlisted in the Mslexia Novel Competition 2022. Her interests are in landscape and its inhabitants – past, present, plant, animal, massive to microscopic.