The British Council has supported these recordings as part of the Shakespeare Lives in 2016 programme celebrating the work of William Shakespeare on the 400th anniversary of his death.
Thirty-Five
As quick as you fell ill, quickly you recover;
A quip returned, a memory uncovered.
Saline drip, subcut, a new route discovered.
You slip into the railed bed, slide under covers.
Outside Glasgow Royal – snow – a thin sheet.
Inside your wit, wisdom makes my heart swell –
Bigger than your water-retaining feet.
Without this love, nothing could ever be well.
A gift the heart wrapped early in this life.
The more you give the more you have to cherish.
If I could offer you my veins, I’d gladly use a knife.
At times it seems if you go, I too will perish.
A mould broke made a new mother of you.
Blood, water, sealed with a kiss: all true
from On Shakespeare’s Sonnets: A Poets’ Celebration edited by Hannah Crawforth & Elizabeth Scott-Baumann (Bloomsbury, 2016), © Jackie Kay 2016, used by permission of the author