IN THE RIALTO

The purpose of this section of the site is to allow us to showcase or preview poems in our publications. We hope to invite writers of the poems to respond and give their view of the work.

Poetry in the rialto

Crow drop

Crow drop

A radio show I sometimes tune into has a long-running feature where listeners write in about objects that have fallen on them from out of the sky – a slice of white bread, an unopened Mars Bar, jar lids and bottle caps, once (or did I imagine it?) a lady’s watch....

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A two poem blog

A two poem blog

Here is one of my favourite poems from the current issue (No. 90), of the magazine. CATFORD CYCLING CLUB RACE THROUGH ASHDOWN FOREST The normal fawn-coloured morning is scored through        with a fast-moving artery of red the jerseys of young bearded men on a...

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1 Poultry

1 Poultry

Shoot up in the fast lift, poke the faux gras with toothpick heels. Late lunch at the Coq d’Argent – accept a drink, plan your exit. After two pm the old religion can be smelt – some urban plague myth – even here, halfway to the holding stacks...

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Decompression by William Stephenson

Decompression by William Stephenson

Decompression The induction program’s willow pattern eyes and terracotta lips matched those of the woman I married in my first incarnation. She whispered, Just you and me darling me darling – a glitch, surely, A stutter in the software – so make yourself yourself. She...

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HOW TO BAKE A GINGERBREAD GIRL   BY EMMA SIMON

HOW TO BAKE A GINGERBREAD GIRL BY EMMA SIMON

HOW TO BAKE A GINGERBREAD GIRL   by Emma Simon Paint blue icing on her fingertips, fingers that could snap with cold, dipped into fridges and glass chillers placing cockleshell cakes in pretty rows. Tie back her hair, dress her in sexless tabards, dab with jam. Press...

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Home by Neetha Kunaratnam

Home by Neetha Kunaratnam

HOME by Neetha Kunaratnam June 23, 2016   I Go Home. We voted leave… Her indignant jaw trembled as she seethed, and the deadpan response I might have mustered froze on my lips, as she brandished a crumpled flyer and unleashed its litany of stats. I’m going I said and...

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Dragged Under  by Ian Humphreys

Dragged Under by Ian Humphreys

DRAGGED UNDER   by Ian Humphreys So many wet shaves in a lifetime. How many thousands and thousands?  So many .............rituals at dawn’s bleached-bone altar, a falter of sharpened steel on skin. So much water               feel it slide .............through your...

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A WITNESS   by Amy Carrington

A WITNESS by Amy Carrington

A WITNESS   by Amy Carrington I've been watching the letterbox, I've been watching her at the letterbox. Her arm is stuck in the rectangle, but not stuck getting out she can't seem to get it any farther in. A gloss-eyed pot fox peers through the doily curtain with me,...

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FIGHT SONG  by Paula Bohince

FIGHT SONG by Paula Bohince

FIGHT SONG  by Paula Bohince August 2014 A crisis on a monitor, and there’s this football field, white chalk formalizing grass, a spongy black track where I walk off my no-baby weight. A deadline has passed, so a journalist will leave this world violently as I go...

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Tristia   by Jacqueline Saphra

Tristia by Jacqueline Saphra

Tristia   by Jacqueline Saphra My friend, we’ve been anchored here for years arguing the toss: semi-colon versus the long dash, our views on Ovid’s Tristia though I haven’t read it, nor have you - and as the room rocks gently underneath us you pour for me a rare tea...

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The Booze by Charlie Bird

The Booze by Charlie Bird

THE BOOZE   by now, the booze is you, you are the booze, mid-rant you stand up too fast, keel over, turn your ankle and I'm supposed to help you up. Oh! the heat and stench of you cursing the world, cursing me, you burst into tears, blurt, 'I'm hurt', that is:...

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Rialto Blogs

Questions and Answers

Questions and Answers

Q. How do I find out what sort of poems The Rialto publishes? So I can select from my poems ones that they’ll like. A. The answer to that used to be simply buy the magazine and read it. However recent issues (96, 98, 100) have been guest edited (by Degna Stone, Edward...

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Close Reading

From time to time, when I’m reading for The Rialto, I come across poems that I really need to write about. Usually my long running wrestle with procrastination gets in the way, but when I wrote the recent Newsletter I found that I was writing about a poem from Issue...

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A reading from The Rialto issue 98

A reading from The Rialto issue 98

The Rialto and Nottingham UNESCO City of Literature invites you to join us online on zoom, with Editor of issue R98, Edward Doegar, for a reading from The Rialto issue number 98. To celebrate the issue we are co-hosting an online reading that showcases the diverse...

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Nature and Place 2022 winners announced

Nature and Place 2022 winners announced

We have now received the results of the 2022 Nature and Place Poetry Competition back from Gillian Clarke and are delighted to announce that the winners are: 1st Prize of £1000 – ‘Blame the Fox’ by Jane Lovell 2nd Prize of £500 – ‘Whales in the Forth’ by Cecilia Rose...

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Pamphlet competition shortlist announced

Pamphlet competition shortlist announced

We are very pleased to announce that the Shortlisted Titles for the 2020 Rialto Pamphlet Competition are, in no particular order, For The Apocalypse Team, Trombone, Hello, Before After, Queerfella, Fridges, Shit Happens, The Sushi Chef’s Wife, The Presence of Absence,...

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WORDSWORTH, NATURE, ETC.

WORDSWORTH, NATURE, ETC.

Had he lived William Wordsworth would have been 250 years old this April (April 7th.,). Celebrations were planned, particularly in Grasmere, Cumbria, home of the excellent Wordsworth Trust. I’m thinking that actual celebrations will not now take place, so here is a...

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Summer 2019

Summer 2019

‘I think this is a really good time for poetry. If anybody ever thought poetry was a luxury, that’s gone. Poetry is a necessary remedy to a lot of the darkness we are subject to.’ Tracy K Smith, USA Poet Laureate, The Observer 30.06.19 The Rialto No. 92 is now out in...

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