from I never thought it would come to this

i.

My worrying love
Is this guess-
Work deprived
Of product

I don’t foresee
The children grown
Tired of my
Affectionate help

As the truth is
These poems
Are about
Our shared future

Belonging to
The class of others
Meaning
To be unmeant

You would rather
Not think about
How children
Answer a need

ii.

Factors that cause the same
People to be encouraged to read

The evidence of the question
Should be obvious and it is

The objective of this study
For the Israeli Defence Forces

The regression to mediocrity
As the conclusion contains

The failure to address the way
Successive predictions share

iii.

As a product of imaginary bounds

Even the thrill of extreme language

Your ill-conceived but defining love

If all errors of bias are treated alike

Does the vulture capitalism pick

iv.

That justifies this
Crude grammar of mis-
Communication
Like a rabbi
A priest and a punchline

I don’t want him to suffer
For me
Even though I want him
To suffer
There is no joke

Without seeking absolution
In complicity
There is no laughter
Without an object
To serve

A purpose
That is its own undoing
All those arbitrary words
Unmeant
And unsaid

As an objection
Provokes the suspicion
Of an objective
The corollaries of love
Intimate

v.

An innocuous reason
Cannot remain
Like a temporary

Means coming to terms
With what is meant
By affordable

Accommodation
As the tenancy of another’s
Desire

Housing
Harbours intent
Trading in excess

Stay extended into the past
Into the right of belonging
Just as

Note: The poems from this sequence were written so that the stanzas could be arranged in any order. The arrangement presented here was chosen by the editor. The sequence responds to a print series of the same name by the artist Jamie George.

Edward Doegar is a poet and editor based in London.