Ingrid Leonard

The Same Question 

Coming home on the bus round Deepdale,
she asks me the question they’ve all asked — 
teachers, pupils, neighbours, the woman 
in the vegetarian café — for a year and a half: 
how’s your brother, then adds in a milli-beat, 
Oh yeah, he’s dead.  Grass is growing
in the fields, a house is being built by 
the Unstan cairn. Later, in my new-decorated 
room with black duvet, apple-white walls, 
I am an adult.  I laugh, laugh.

Ingrid Leonard lives in London and comes from Orkney, a place which greatly influences her poetry. She graduated from Newcastle University in 2017 with an MA in Writing Poetry. Her work has been published in Brittle Star, Northwords Now and New Writing Scotland.