As it’s Poetry Day, here’s an extract from my book – Labyrinth: one classic film, fifty-five sonnets:

The goblins heard. The goblins came. Strange calm
descended swiftly on the baby’s room
and Sarah, fearful of some eerie harm,
searched for her half-brother, in the half-gloom.
Beneath his blanket, someone – something? – stirred.
She drew it back – but there was nothing there.
Then low unsettling noises could be heard,
behind, around her – goblins, everywhere!
A shadow, a reflection somehow strange,
a glimpse of tail, of helmet or of horn.
A white owl, flapping at the window panes,
attempted entry through the long French doors.
One more lightning flash, a blast of thunder –
she turned, to see the windows flung asunder.

The owl became a man; his majesty
such that the very air did seem to sing.
And Sarah wondered if she should curtsey,
for surely this was Jareth – Goblin King.
His windswept hair, a mane of tawny blond.
His eyes most magical; one dark, one light.
His face a mask of mischief, cruel, yet fond.
His garments, darkness; blue, his cloak of night.
Black were his boots, his gloves, his collar high,
and breastplate leather, with accents of bone –
upon his chest, a pendant triangle
with curving arms, wrought of silver, of gold.
Though Sarah tried her rash words to retract,
“What’s said, is said” he uttered – stating fact.

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E-book available now, hardback book coming very soon.