As part of Spread the Word’s Lewisham, Borough of Literature campaign, four local writers were commissioned to create new work under the theme, ‘To All The Places I have Read’. The commissions were for writers of poetry or short stories, are aged 18+, currently living in Lewisham and from underrepresented backgrounds.

The Borough of Literature Commissions were printed, alongside Emerging Writer and Deaf and Disabled Writer commissions, in the Deptford Literature Fesitval Anthology.

On the 172 and back by Fathima Zahra

No alarm for me this morn – just the woman cussing 

out her man elsewhere     not here   at the front 

of the bus   I put away my book    where the writer

shuttles in and out of the hospital for her lover,

slipping away.

In the waiting room    eyes dart

between the glossy signs    and people

hunched over screens. 

‘I’m deffo missing an ovary’ 

the girl ahead of me announces 

and I put my book down   probe the dark 

beyond the door   where the radiographer 

with a headteacher’s glare summons.

In a week, the doctor will call. In fifty 

pages, the woman will have slept with someone 

else and the cloud breaks in the winter sky. 

I walk light. Finish my book. Wink 

at my past self   at the bus stop 

think only of the pink roses 

in our neighbour’s front yard

when we first moved.

About Fatima Zahra

Fathima Zahra is an Indian poet, performer and facilitator based in London.  

She is an alum of the Roundhouse Poetry Collective, Barbican Young Poets and BBC 1Xtra Words First. Her poems have won the Bridport Prize, Asia House Poetry Slam and Wells Fest Young Poets Prize. She has performed her work at venues across the UK including Hay Festival, Latitude and Last Word festival.  

Her debut pamphlet ‘sargam / swargam’ (ignitionpress, 2021) was selected as Poetry Book Society’s pamphlet choice. She completed her MA in Creative Writing and Education at Goldsmiths University of London, with distinction.