Ministry of Fools

My job is soul destroying

days of shifting paper

working at the Ministry of Fools

Some say change is coming

while Adnan sits in prison

I still sit waiting, like I did at school

where the teachers didn’t understand

my loving Father’s legacy

hanging full around me like a noose

Tell Catherine that I loved her

make the statement plain

not the lasting legacy I’d choose

John Darwin is a poet from Manchester.

Much of his work is inspired by his experiences as a frequent visitor to Turkey since the 1990s.

His most recent books include solo collections ‘I meet myself returning’ and ‘Ultrasilence’, published by Flapjack Press in 2019 and 2022.

He won the Best Spoken Word Show award at the Greater Manchester Fringe in 2021 with his show ‘Happy Hour’.