Listen to the world’s best poetry read out loud.

Send me a real dog-faced ape

that rides a dog, and plays the harp

or lute, who goes ‘la la la la’

and stands upside-down in the park.

We’ll walk round flower-beds,

through rooms of light,

looking for the room I fell in love in,

singing Stella Maris in my bra.

That’s where the velvet monkey lived.

I wanted him. I saw his dark red fingers

crush his dress.

He was my sister Mary’s doll, not mine.

My present was my first geranium,

that smelled of peppermints and had no bones.

It was a post. I wanted a baboon.

They come from Abyssinia in crates.