Men's Voices: Miners: South Wales by Robert Nisbet

He lived in the capital for twenty years
but often, in a near-sleep dark,
recalled the men’s pub voices,
family voices, confidential, cordial,
with their narratives of work and character.
He rarely heard the voices raised in anger
(as they must at times have been)
but would sometimes hear, distantly,
as on a hillside, rising to sky,
the voices, with the women’s,
drawn, by funeral or simple impulse,
to four-part harmony.
Sometimes, hushed and husky voices,
shadowed by dust and time.



*First published in Shot Glass Journal (2020)

Robert Nisbet is a Welsh poet living some 30 miles down the coast from Dylan Thomas’s Boathouse. His work has appeared widely in Britain and the USA, where he has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize (twice) and for a Best of the Net award.