David Morley won the Ted Hughes Award for New Poetry in 2016 for The Invisible Gift: Selected Poems.
cindering softly under us, slow-cooking the marshlands.
'The gate ought to be here. The map said so.
somewhere this way where sheep shove through.
with thrilled-up ears, barged him skilfully to a stop.
'I said that gate was around here,' pointing a mile or two.
ourselves senseless sampling some imaginary species of coleoptera . . .
and sprint, each footing a tiny dazzle to prism.
that midnights all blue? How can crimson redden before you?
The old map mutters that Here Be Dragons, and it lies.
Here be Darters, Skimmers, drawn flame. Here, are dragonflies.
his notebook, or perhaps his mind, with all that staring at water.
of predators. Does he ever get any of this right? Is he unwise?
never satisfied with the data of darkness or statistics of sunlight.
getting it not right, never or not quite like the water fly in Hamlet.