Bad Lilies
LightNews LightNews
banner
badlilies.bsky.social
Bad Lilies
@badlilies.bsky.social
1.9K followers 420 following 160 posts
A digital poetry journal, edited by @kathryngray.bsky.social and @andrewjamesneilson.bsky.social Enjoy our blooms! badlilies.uk
Posts Replies Media Videos
badlilies.bsky.social
'Dissent at the Temple of Gemini' by @austinwriting.bsky.social badlilies.uk/austin-allen-2
Dissent at the Temple of Gemini None of us loves the Leader all that much, although, of course, we keep this to ourselves whenever Sphere and Azure are around. Azure might look the other way, but Sphere (always with that damn tablet in his garment) would have you written up before first light and E-5'd straight into the Outer Zone. True, that's his role, but it's the way he plays it—
November 7, 2025 at 4:39 PM
badlilies.bsky.social
Two poems by Rafael Peñas Cruz badlilies.uk/rafael-penas-cruz
from Running Thoughts 4 Unnerved at first by the buzzard's low flying approach towards me, diving so close that I could hear the displaced air as its wings cut through it, I understood the bird wished me away from the secret tree where it keeps its chicks. But perhaps it just wanted to befriend me. It keeps coming to me, hovering above, as I lie down to rest and take in the morning's scents and sounds, its colours. I pause for a while and try not to think about anything, just blanking out my mind, delving into the emptiness of everything, much as the buzzard delves into the great East Anglia sky.
November 7, 2025 at 2:42 PM
badlilies.bsky.social
'Matrilinear' by @lkiew.bsky.social badlilies.uk/l-kiew
Matrilinear (after Gego, Tronco No 2, (Trunk), 1975) Mama Ele twists shadows left and right; long nose reaches, grabs, tugs and presses constantly. Sun warms networked neurons, hairlines of sway and slack. Trunk tip touches, tangles up planes, creates volumes and nets of space. She delineates worlds, the trails her daughters follow, how a line operates and beyond.
November 6, 2025 at 2:23 PM
badlilies.bsky.social
'Shrimp Saganaki' by Paul Stephenson badlilies.uk/paul-stephenson-2
Shrimp Saganaki 'I really like things that straddle' was the last phrase that left Jim's mouth before he ran across the road to meet his girlfriend Lisa to catch the catamaran to the next small island at high-speed. 'Straddle' was his final word as he stood up at the pavement table unsure of paying inside or out, even of staying longer, until he got the sudden call, and if the truth be told, he was himself a straddler of sorts, something between
November 6, 2025 at 12:13 PM
badlilies.bsky.social
Three poems by @timturnbull.bsky.social badlilies.uk/tim-turnbull
Ghost Ship In the umbrous gloom of the North Atlantic a familiar but indistinct shape glides, slipping quietly between ice bergs and floes. No one sees it pass. Lookouts of warships and cargo vessels alike turn away while sonar registers nothing at all. Under the surface, bathyscaphe footage confirms a soundlessly decaying hulk, iron plates and bulkheads crumbling in salt, obscured by algal blooms and encrustations, host to rubbery, dead-eyed brutish things, home to scuttling, awful armoured things,
November 5, 2025 at 2:08 PM
badlilies.bsky.social
'Oregon' by Mel Tibbs badlilies.uk/mel-tibbs
Oregon We drive so far. Places slide past the window: Chuckanut, Samish, Tillicum. A paper bag greased with the spice of Portland potatoes, jojos - quirk of the country's upper left corner.
November 5, 2025 at 10:35 AM
badlilies.bsky.social
Three poems by @ravoon.bsky.social badlilies.uk/graeme-richardson-1
Oxford Triptych In Holywell Cemetery Swirling iron, craquelure and rust, shuddering with slowly crawling cars. Earth absorbs the poison with the dust; graves await an amaranthine grass. Tourists come to look for Kenneth Grahame's, noting that it first contained his son. Elder covers up the single names, Heberden and Pater overrun. Study a disaster, love a grief. Trying to make it better makes it worse. Restoration left to a naif brandishing the bluntest secateurs. Loving without knowing isn't love. Knowing without loving is half-known. Lovers know they never know enough. Scholars know they end up here alone. So, through love or wisdom, we perform homage to what's dead as though we must. Sunset glows against the coming storm: swirling iron, craquelure and rust.
November 4, 2025 at 12:08 PM
badlilies.bsky.social
'Melted cockerel' by @betarish.bsky.social badlilies.uk/rishi-dastidar
Melted cockerel At Notre-Dame Selfies under a crown of thorns. An American explains the cockerel to the tour guide; I presume she curses him silently in a third language. A girl in lace, eyes candle-wicked shut, prays to Saint Joan. Her flag is sharp; god I'd like to believe; how do you do it, turn it on like a tap? Always, They text, with these questions, when you step into this gilded Time Machine. I can read your mind; so I know you said Luther was right. You'd like to lose the fear, disappear? Faith is a texture. Buy the rosary, pretend it's a bracelet; enjoy the crucifix digging into your veins, gently. Feeling alive isn't the sin you think it is, but believing it trumps all is.
November 4, 2025 at 10:28 AM
badlilies.bsky.social
'In Defence of Red Caitlin' by
@zoebrigley.bsky.social
badlilies.uk/zoe-brigley-1
In Defence of Red Caitlin i.m. Caitlin Macnamara (later Thomas, wife of the poet Dylan Thomas) 1913-1994 Dear Caitlin, all those things they said when they reviewed your grim autobiography. They tell us you are haunted and confused, that the chapters describing your happy childhood with your bisexual, bohemian mother are dull, but you are also outrageous, obnoxious and irresponsible leading a life of squalor and madness, neglectful of children, full of hatred and self-loathing,
November 3, 2025 at 1:40 PM
badlilies.bsky.social
Three poems by @kristianevans.bsky.social badlilies.uk/kristian-evans
Nettles i.m. my father Eifion Evans 1956-2022 Someone has gone down the lane, taken it upon themselves to slash the nettles back. In the sky a busy pungent ghost is telling tales, dumb riddles, breathless clecs in perfume, the sweet aftermath. Once upon a time. As night follows day. How many years now have passed? I remember your magnifying glass, pointing out the brittle needles. I need prayer, solid words to cry, a sting to sign. My hand in your hand held fast.
November 3, 2025 at 10:17 AM
badlilies.bsky.social
Two poems by Jennifer Militello badlilies.uk/jennifer-mil...
the lab The trash out back is history's clock. It stops to rot. It ranks in acts. Its reek is scattered. Its stink is fat. I map it when I walk. Interiors small. All quiet, sleek. Xed, I eek. Driving at the speed of dark. No place to go that is not raw. All awe. Smokes smut. It lacks a flourish. It's not anything that zeroes in or is born. Linoleum catches at the doorway like a bruise. Chapters rage and lord.
November 2, 2025 at 12:00 PM
badlilies.bsky.social
Two poems by Daniel Sluman badlilies.uk/daniel-sluman-1
Chronic god whispered in my ear but the only word I caught was pain lord I have learnt to suffer well to keep silent as the lit nerve stirs my body into meaning each morning each time it begins like a murmur somewhere inside me
November 2, 2025 at 9:08 AM
badlilies.bsky.social
'Pacific Swift' by @stoneandthestar.bsky.social badlilies.uk/clarissa-aykroyd-1
Pacific Swift Swing with the planet masts tilt down toward space Surface glowing heaven above the sky of the water Air expanding through the open door of moonlight Waiting for anchor drag like bones scraping But it never comes To swing so lightly on a ship on a line A kite on a string in a heavier element still seen by angels
November 1, 2025 at 2:15 PM
badlilies.bsky.social
'The Real Names of Things' by John Stammers badlilies.uk/john-stammers-1
The Real Names of Things The real names of things are hidden from us. The dragonfly is green daylight through a rippled pane or filaments of green gold from a lamé dress whilst its inner self remains inviolate and shut. Too much is known as exterior impressions, too much for the blue jay's feather to overbear upon our partial comprehensions so shatters to nameless blue fragments.
November 1, 2025 at 12:05 PM
badlilies.bsky.social
Our issue spotlight begins with two poems by Yvonne Reddick! badlilies.uk/yvonne-reddick
Fern Owl Two of you flew over Pendle Hill as my love and I followed the path to its brow. I strained my ears to hear you halloo over the wood. Flame-marks ring each eye's inferno. Horned head, furred toes curl to hooks, you are a spectre to shrews, woe of voles.
November 1, 2025 at 9:36 AM
badlilies.bsky.social
While we are on the subject of our new issue, an update on current submissions!
SUBMISSIONS FAQ UPDATE: Our submissions window is currently closed. If you submitted to our window over August 2025, please bear with us as we received an unprecedented number of poems. We are reading, however, for issues into 2026 and so will be in touch as soon as we can.
October 24, 2025 at 4:20 PM
badlilies.bsky.social
Proofs to contributors are being prepared...our cracking new issue is out for Halloween in a week's time 👀👻⚓️ badlilies.uk
Issue Twenty-Two: Ghost Ship
October 24, 2025 at 1:05 PM
badlilies.bsky.social
'Tomorrow' by @jsaphra.bsky.social badlilies.uk/jacqueline-saphra-1
Tomorrow Tuesday becomes elastic like a shadow stretched under the sun Wednesday buries itself in laundry and fiscal responsibilities Thursday mutters about hospitals and feeds you seeds and sorrow Concerning the remains of days rabbits and hats come to mind the jiggery-pokery trickery of the temporal magician
July 10, 2025 at 12:31 PM
badlilies.bsky.social
'Starry night over the Rhône' by @garethprior.bsky.social badlilies.uk/gareth-prior-2
Starry night over the Rhône If you believe, love, that all matter is energy half-stilled to a slow vibration, or this wild pulse of space the antiphonal craving of stars and river; if you know - somehow - the veil can lift imperfectly from a moored craft or swollen art; if as you leave, musing back at the foreground "Who is this blur of loss, and are there two?" - always the answer is you and I and all who've known the swirls above touching this recreated love under a fleeting sky.
July 10, 2025 at 8:44 AM
badlilies.bsky.social
Four poems by @greeningpoet.bsky.social www.badlilies.uk/john-greenin...
In Texas Before any of the guests can say they love my accent, I am asked by the breakfast receptionist Are you with the firefighters? I seem to have arrived in time for this swaggering convention of overweight men - all white, except for the shoeshine in the lobby. But also it's the anniversary of David Koresh's inferno which has never quite gone out (a Netflix series starts tonight) in Waco. The day I leave, they'1l celebrate a different guy, who's here to light the fuse on his own cult. And no, I'm not a firefighter, sadly.
July 9, 2025 at 12:30 PM
badlilies.bsky.social
'The Lammergeier’s Shadow' by @gitaralleigh.bsky.social badlilies.uk/gita-ralleigh-1
The Lammergeier's Shadow If your body is the map, its icy ridges limbs, this heart is a wellspring. Rushing source of streaming vessels, flooded breath-clouds, violaceous bruise of fractal capillaries. Newly stilled, your mind chants neuronal traces as you gain the summit: sculpted ruin of oceans. Your lips dark shaligrams, arrowed and horned.
July 9, 2025 at 9:40 AM
badlilies.bsky.social
'For Sale' by marcadimartino.bsky.social www.badlilies.uk/marc-alan-di...
For Sale I've seen this family through thick and thin: a war, six popes, three blighted marriages, lonely late-night alcohol-fueled purges, betrayal, subterfuge, redemption, zen; the feuds, the fratricide, the brotherly love, the lust, the pride, humility and greed, the wine, the nicotine, the dregs, the dread which lines the human psyche like a glove.
July 8, 2025 at 11:22 AM
badlilies.bsky.social
Two poems by @imogenforster.bsky.social badlilies.uk/imogen-forster
Bird / Machine Botaurus, the ventriloquist bittern, unlocatable, works the bellows of his chest, camouflaged in dry reeds. Crex crex, the corncrake, keeps his creaky time from a bed of nettles, a rusty metronome. Troglodytes, the wren, a little wind-up toy, his loud song broken at mid-point by a hard metallic rattle.
July 8, 2025 at 8:49 AM
badlilies.bsky.social
'Pendant' by Alan Buckley badlilies.uk/alan-buckley-1
Pendant An ounce of silver, reclaimed from an antique mirror's back, becomes a little frame, with a spindle top to bottom, on which sits a small gold disc (a broken chain melted down). Old, unwanted things transformed: now it's a window, through which the sun pours itself, filling the room with light; now a first pulsing nestled in the womb, tiny, but equally bright.
July 7, 2025 at 2:09 PM
badlilies.bsky.social
Two poems by @sarahbwestcottpoet.bsky.social badlilies.uk/sarah-westcott-1
The last 'o' o If we could hear him in the woods, would we listen, would we care? Would we recognise his song, a voice it took this world to shape — a voice it took this world to shape, a voice that sings to us of guilt, a voice that sings to us of guilt, complicity. We turn and turn amongst the trees. We turn and turn away, bowed to the keyboard's face, bowed to these keys, our own lost songs. Would we listen, would we bear our own music if we could hear him singing in the world again?
July 7, 2025 at 12:06 PM