ISSN: 1941-4137
POETRY THAT ENACTS THE ARTISTIC AND CREATIVE PURITY OF GLASS
POETRY THAT ENACTS THE ARTISTIC AND CREATIVE PURITY OF GLASS
jw summerisle is an autistic poet from the English East Midlands. A former Foyle Young Poet of the Year, they have two chapbooks in print: kinfolk (2022) with Black Sunflowers Poetry Press, and the book of bad mothers (2024) with Back Room Poetry. They have recently been featured in Steel Jackdaw, Red Words and Mugwort Magazine.
Previously in Glass: A Journal of Poetry:
beechey island nudes
February 4, 2026
gratitude is not the same as forgiveness
i don’t know why i fixate on cathedrals i
don’t know what i’m wanting to find there.
in coventry, it’s built of light;
brute angels scratch for the sky windows
icy from their touch finger-cut
glass freezing faces when i ask them for relief
(they are not impressed).
i only want what’s not reciprocated, please —
i’m so grateful for the stone steps and concrete blocks.
the ruin of god behind me.it’s someplace to go
at least.
This poem is, superficially, about visiting the new cathedral in Coventry, England, that was built in the 1960s directly opposite the ruins of the city’s medieval cathedral that was destroyed during the Blitz in the 1940s. While it has always been free to access the ruined cathedral site, it used to cost £5 to enter the new cathedral which, for me at the time, was more than I had or could afford. (I used to have a bus pass to get to school, which meant I could ride anywhere, anytime between Leicester and Coventry, but the pass cost almost all the money I made in a month working weekends while being in full-time education). There are a set of stone steps between the old cathedral and new. I used to ride the almost 2-hour (one way) journey regularly just to sit on the steps looking down at the tall windows of the modern cathedral, which stretch way up high and are covered floor-to-ceiling in angels and saints etched into glass by the artist John Hutton. They are very errie, ghostly and expressionistic. In more abstract terms, this poem is about the attempt to be grateful for and take comfort in a bad situation whilst not erring on the side of forgiveness for ongoing abuse, privation and strife. It may be romantic to be a beggar, but it’s not a choice anyone would make.
Glass: A Journal of Poetry is published weekly by Glass Poetry Press.
All contents © the author.
All contents © the author.
