Imogen McHugh’s poem ‘After her recruitment’ came second in the Best Single Poem category of the 2025 Disabled Poets Prize.

The Disabled Poets Prize looks to find the best work created by UK-based deaf and disabled poets.

After her recruitment

The god of the dead works from home and lately, she’s getting tired 

by 8pm. It’s not so much the paperwork as it is 

the paper — skin thin and so hard 

to file away. Sometimes the paper has the dew of the final sweat, 

she can can feel herself shudder 

in damp sympathy. 

The god of the dead doesn’t know much 

about Death — Death only stops by to complain about the hours. 

She is the abacus and Death is moving the beads across, 

Not one at a time but in handfuls 

She doesn’t ask him to take care. 

He takes so much, already. 

The god of the dead makes calls but only briefly 

to hear the breath of the living. Time passes quickly 

on the line but she feels guilty, if she enjoys it, guilty at the weekend, 

she feels guilty about overtime. 

The god of the dead doesn’t see family, anymore, and they’ve stopped 

trying to stop by. How can you reach someone 

who has carefully curated each brick of the wall 

around themself? How can you tear down the only thing 

they have made, for themself? 

The god of the dead doesn’t cry — and why waste 

What you haven’t got? 

She never cried for anyone 

And she can’t start now. 

About Imogen McHugh

Imogen McHugh is a young disabled poet from Norwich, England. She has an MA in poetry and one book of poems currently published: A King’s Bones, which came out in 2022. She has also been featured by BBC Radio Four’s New Frequencies program.