Traditional Nest Material
Crows and magpies using anti-bird spikes
to build nests, researchers find
My sister says How could you
bring a child into this world.
I get it—not like galvanised iron
is the ideal nest lining.
Who’d choose polycarbonate
spikes in the morning,
needle pricks at night? But why
let the world win. Am I right?
I don’t know about bring, but
I’d toss a kid into the mix.
Breed ‘em tough. Malicious compliance
I’d teach, if the tarmac stinks
shit wherever, if the phone rings constantly
faux-ring constantly back.
I wouldn’t rather not exist.
City blocks function as NICU incubator,
smog clouds my biological clockface
but I swear the apocalypse
is always incoming, for all epochs. Like
the half-portion of peanut butter
slicked in the jar—won’t you scrape,
twirl your knife like a feather?
As a father, I’d come to terms.
I’d spread further. Even here, even now.
“Traditional Nest Material”, excerpted from The Character Actor Convention © 2025 by Guy Elston. Reprinted by permission of The Porcupine’s Quill.
The Character Actor Convention by Guy Elston, published by The Porcupine’s Quill, 2025.
About The Character Actor Convention:
A pumpkin writes a letter to his father. A sheep recalls a revolution, and love. Hydrogen pens a tell all exposé of Oxygen. The Stick Insect Orders His Tomb. Napoleon counts waves and cheats at cards. A sunflower seeks answers – why sun? A crow considers children in this cruel, spiky world. And all the while, character actors gather for the endless convention...
Guy Elston’s debut is a curious smorgasbord of personas, voices and (un)natural perspectives. Through impossible encounters and strange viewpoints an insistent, ever-shifting ‘I’ questions its relation to itself. Wist, wit, and obsession rise like tides, are forgotten, and start fresh. Authenticity is always just round the corner.
The Character Actor Convention is not urgent, timely or topical. It’s something else.
Guy Elston
About Guy Elston:
Guy Elston was born and raised in Oxford, UK. After various jobs, journeys and other lifetimes he surfaced in Toronto in 2020. He has an MA in History from the University of Amsterdam. Since moving to Canada his poetry has been published by The Malahat Review, Canadian Literature, Event, The Literary Review of Canada, Vallum, The Antigonish Review and other journals. His chapbook Automatic Sleep Mode was published by Anstruther Press in 2023. His debut full-length collection, The Character Actor Convention, is forthcoming from The Porcupine's Quill in 2025. Guy lives in Toronto and can be found at poetry events. He’s a member of the Meet the Presses collective and is a first reader for Untethered magazine.