Ben Willems
SOCIETY PAGES
James Middleton runs an online greeting card company called Boomf. That makes him an entrepreneur. He’s getting married to this French woman called Alize. She’s in finance. I look at their picture. Smiling. On a yacht. I’m vaguely conscious he grew up about 10 miles from where I did. Check on Wikipedia. Born in the Royal Berks same as me. I was over that way earlier in the year. This guy gave me half a pint even though the pub was shut to the public. He worked on the estate. We talked about Brexit. He was against it from the peace dividend point of view. The same day I’d scrawled “HOW’S BREXIT GOING? TOSSERS” in the Wetherspoons toilet in Newbury. That was after I left my phone on the train. People were really kind that day. Some guy, completely legless midday on a Monday, let me use his phone to ring mine. It was early spring, sunny, but little sense of life emerging Hang-gliders drifted off Combe Hill. In the far distance I picked out the white knub of the water tower in Tilehurst. Childhood chocolate bars, teenage acne scars. Behind me the path over the downs into Wiltshire but it would get too dark and cold. |
SOFT LEFTIES
Soft lefties on settees got a peerage and an OBE grew up watching Wor Jackie or so they’d have you believe post-dated post-prandial at Glastonbury Fred Perry and cargo shorts a good feed is its own reward Never say Marx Never say capital Never say no to money or class say yes and doors will open studio time succession Charity martyr Bedside manner School of hard grooming Lord Mayor’s dinner Un-threatening apart from when there’s rumblings in the lower orders You’re the officer You’re the commander What the fuck did we hire you for? And don’t ever turn the guns on us Your neck Your cojones Abbottabad out of testosterone Keep your Garibaldis in your biscuit tin Don’t be a hero like Martin Luther King OH WEH-ES-LEY STREE-TING! OH WEH-ES-LEY STREE-TING! If it works it’s worth repeating dog pitch nasal self-defeating bonfire of the bacon butties tap tap tap to die for not what you subscribed for High Five! She’s crying in the toilets! Don’t get politics yet? People – the right ones the wrong ones Power – is like a string of onions a stream of minions a maze of dungeons the work of millions the swing of truncheons a bead of sweat a toenail an incisor an angle grinder an inside job a lesson an obsession a procession of reptilians |
SOLILOQUY RAZGRAD
Today I want to know where Razgrad is. Bulgaria It has a famous mosque. I retrace my steps in Radcliffe Is Pollitt Street named after Harry Pollitt? I hope so And then there’s Radcliffe-on-Trent, Ratcliffe-on-Soar power station. Mark Kennedy, undercover cop aka Mark Stone, Mark Flash. Did our paths ever cross? Like at Drax, 2006. Rats was a quality midfielder Westwood Wanderers u-14s. Just put Rats into Google. You won’t find him. Rab C Nesbitt. Dominic Raab. Erno Rubik. Rabble to robot. Intensely relaxed. Yes they rob I. Re-enact: the Bayeaux Tapestry. Redact: the Domesday inventory. Old money. Rollover. Random number generator: 48. Post-trauma. I have a medal somewhere. Costly, I guess to be resurrected. Furnish. Accumulate. No gaps Razgrad Bulgaria. Apu Azaria. First rate patio dead hitchhiker. Retrograde. Stowaway. Umwelt |
TRAFFICK
from a cellar Charleroi drives to beaches blonde girls wanton INNOCENCE harvester from the kit bag chocolate treats hand thank yous MAKING IT first team off ON and off voyeuristic gymnasts tennis players owner’s STABLE tickle me sly FEEL fertile figurine dough eyed in the takeaway rolled into VODKA stubble COCAINE dropped empty crisp packet upstairs private dorms of early jerky soapy breathey these now POWERFUL men BEND or break she teaches HOW to please saddles them such debilitating CHARM kisses fishes striving on the hook |
Dave Morgan
Entwistle With Gary Snyder
So you’re sitting on that outcrop looking down the valley through the man-made forest and just catching a glimpse of the
lake through the trees and it’s a big sky, all as you imagined and no-one comes on this track which is mainly overgrown and
you’ve been treading whinberries for twenty minutes and in no way is this isolation, you’re only two miles from an A road;
and on a day like this it doesn’t feel like desolation, it’s not quite approaching dark, and there’s no fear of puma or bear
although beware the midges, they can eat you alive; a short way to the East is the city and its satellites, and in that
metropolis of a million there are people who are more isolated , more desolate, more threatened and you marvel at your
luck and take credit for your initiative in hiking from that bus stop on that A road, when you suddenly become aware of
someone beside you and it’s not frightening, but it’s about to become chastening as Gary says; that’s your trouble friend,
overthinking, you’re polluting the best of the day with your idle thoughts when all you have to do is let go, soak yourself in
the clean air, if there are no lilies at least consider the heather, breathe it in, become part of it, put your rational thoughts
aside for just ten minutes…. just ten minutes, they’ll still be there to chew you up, later, no point of making this small
journey to ruin it with thinking’; and the sun is setting behind you, and an orange glow suffuses that little snatch of lake, and
a pale crescent moon, scarcely visible appears above the city in the East, and the air is warm and still, and the midges are
enjoying their supper, but it doesn’t matter until tomorrow.
So you’re sitting on that outcrop looking down the valley through the man-made forest and just catching a glimpse of the
lake through the trees and it’s a big sky, all as you imagined and no-one comes on this track which is mainly overgrown and
you’ve been treading whinberries for twenty minutes and in no way is this isolation, you’re only two miles from an A road;
and on a day like this it doesn’t feel like desolation, it’s not quite approaching dark, and there’s no fear of puma or bear
although beware the midges, they can eat you alive; a short way to the East is the city and its satellites, and in that
metropolis of a million there are people who are more isolated , more desolate, more threatened and you marvel at your
luck and take credit for your initiative in hiking from that bus stop on that A road, when you suddenly become aware of
someone beside you and it’s not frightening, but it’s about to become chastening as Gary says; that’s your trouble friend,
overthinking, you’re polluting the best of the day with your idle thoughts when all you have to do is let go, soak yourself in
the clean air, if there are no lilies at least consider the heather, breathe it in, become part of it, put your rational thoughts
aside for just ten minutes…. just ten minutes, they’ll still be there to chew you up, later, no point of making this small
journey to ruin it with thinking’; and the sun is setting behind you, and an orange glow suffuses that little snatch of lake, and
a pale crescent moon, scarcely visible appears above the city in the East, and the air is warm and still, and the midges are
enjoying their supper, but it doesn’t matter until tomorrow.
It’s a Wanderful World
I love to wander towards the light without a plan no end in sight without a goal no rush just stroll harmless lazy walking where my senses do the talking Hear the sound of silent footsteps See the imprint form, then disappear Taste the space I am creating Touch the air I am displacing Smell the scent of sweet surprise Open my eyes and Breathe A wanderful mind will go, will go where it will go. Mindful and merciful. Never mind, always mind, just let it wander. |
Perseids in Bordeaux
Two bottles in Lying on my back Willing the movement of the moon Tracking the passage of satellites Wishing on the appearance of shooting stars Capturing the architecture of constellations Thinking ‘It’s a job and a half Being the centre of the Universe’. You are lying three foot away. I sense your heat. I want to reach across This infinite space. To touch you. In the kitchen my wife makes coffee. |
The Storm
Storm? What storm? A little turbulence, a skirmish with a squall A punch up with an unmapped current The odd uncharted eddy. We rode it out with ease, it’s a tidy little vessel The crew handpicked, well trained, prepared To traverse new waters. Although a few complained, most never noticed We have distractions, ‘another hand of bridge madam?’ ‘Compliments of the Captain sir’ enough for most. OK steerage kicked off, they always do What do they expect for what they pay? A few went over, dead of night, unnoticed. We drifted blithely under a cloudless sky The doldrums, you could hear a pin drop So still, the fish came up to admire our aimlessness. We’ve had to manage without First Mate Locked up aft, hallucinating about black clouds Somewhere over the horizon. Storm, what storm? |
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Biography:
Dave Morgan has had a number of careers in Education and Community Work. He has studied and worked in Stoke on Trent, Swansea, Oxford, Bolton, Liverpool and Salford. He co-founded Write out Loud in 2002.and Live from Worktown in 2014 with whom he has organised a number of Arts and Heritage Festivals, and a regular modern jazz promotion. .In 2006 he adapted and directed the late Hovis Presley's Poetic off Licence as a play for voices and toured it in venues ranging from the Royal Exchange studio to the 2007 Latitude Festival. His first short collection of poems, Chuang Tse's Caterpillar,was published in 2016 by Flapjack Press. He has a long standing interest in East Asian literature and taught Chinese Cookery for several years in a well known string of holiday camps. A career highlight was performing with composer David Amram at the 2016 Lowell Celebrates Kerouac Festival in Massachusetts. His work can be found on line at www.davemorgan.info www.livefromworktown.org www.writeoutloud.net |
Aoife Mannix
Anna Livia
She was a woman in water collecting sweet wrappers. Her hair the long sobs of a drunk wandering home in the small hours. Lost kisses carved into her eyes. The floozy in the jacuzzi, the whore in the sewer. You had to know her to make that rhyme. None of those grey men in wigs were so abused and slurred. They stood around in solemn silence, their crimes forgotten, but she was closer to the streets, the rebel songs my grandmother whistled even when the words were banned. They replaced her with a giant needle pointing up to the future. Sharp, unforgiving, uncomplicated. Not a place where question marks congregated but a story moved on. What remains, what is removed. At Twenty There were platform heels across cobblestones, a vodka bottle sunk like a stone. Cowboys and angels, sailing across the specks on the carpet, the sitting room spinning glitter ball broken fish tanks as we danced till four am. The rain in the moonlit street, boys thinner than shadows. Saucer kisses, aeroplane tickets, always on the edge of goodbye. We were so fucking gorgeous if only we’d known. Walk My neighbour’s husband comes out of the woods on his crutches. He says the prime minister has sent him a letter to let him know he’s on some death list or other. We all look over the fresh yellow of the field, so vivid in the sunshine, the trees just bursting into blossom. Who decides who breathes or not? Who is protected or not? Who is left to die alone? The arbitrary numbers march relentlessly on while the sky is endless blue over our heads. Nearly Nine Minutes The streets are on fire with an anger that sits in the throats of the silenced. Shattered glass, pepper spray tongues. The words contagious as they lick along the skin. A house so white its fiddler has injected bleach into the veins of a nation. Poison behind the masks. A police officer kneeling on the neck of a black man. How much murder can they expect to get away with? |
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Biography: Aoife Mannix
Aoife is the author of four collections of poetry: The Trick of Foreign Words (2002); The Elephant in the Corner (2005); Growing Up An Alien (2007) and Turn The Clocks Upside Down (2008).She is a well-known performer of her work, having taken part in the 2002/03 Apples & Snakes Writers on the Storm tour and the 2003/04 Kin (Renaissance One) tour. She toured with Heather Taylor, Canadian poet, with their show Accents on Words and in 2007/08 appeared in her own poetry and music show Growing Up an Alien, produced by Apples & Snakes. Her work has been broadcast on BBC Radio 3 and 4, London Live and the BBC World Service, and she has written two drama documentaries for BBC Radio 4. In 2006 her short play Parallels was performed at the Latchmere Theatre and in 2004 she was shortlisted for the BBC Two Timing Competition with her TV sitcom, Since Dad Left. She has also recorded a CD with musician Richard Lewis - Did You Forget to Take Your Tablets? Aoife has been commissioned to write pieces for the National Gallery, the Medway Fuse Festival and for Glasgow 2020. She has been Poet in Residence for the Central Foundation School for Girls and for the SW11 Literary Festival, and is a skilled workshop leader, writing tutor and mentor. She also managed the Royal Court Young Writers' Programme. Her poetry has appeared in a number of anthologies and literary magazines, and she has performed extensively in many venues, including at several Literature Festivals and at the South Bank Centre. In 2007 she gave performances and workshops in Taiwan, Thailand and India, touring with the British Council. Her first novel is Heritage of Secrets (2008). |
Andy Npoet
Return to the everyday mists of normality Unexpected like you had stepped You can hear them call at your cricket club Not to each other that the ball Had out gone for a six as you walked past but to you to let you know it had re-opened unexpected. Unexpected the email Hung quiet in your thoughts When one of your regular poetry nights Pre-lockdown announces it is opening soon And the pair of you look at each other Wondering is it safe? Is it too soon? And then unexpected, your gym re-opens With a free month offer to try to get you to go Away from the local woods And the horses that have almost Become your friends In the absence of people, And then your works that sent you home At the end of March frightened over the virus If you stayed there much longer Start emailing you to say from next week They are going to start asking people To start returning to work. And you then speak to your father After reading what the government have announced Who had been housebound for four months Saying he may have believed them more if They said they were building a bridge to the moon After what he had gone through And you listen to the water pooling in the groove At the local water reservoir in agreement The breeze rattling the trees Which had given up warning of social distancing Now starts up with words mirroring your concerns Or new guideposts of what it thinks you should do From out of the causeway next to the train station to telling your works it’s too soon benching yourself in your thoughts back home within seconds It’s over but you know it’s not. |
Hopeless Rescue
Lost in pensive regrets The wind blows over the deserted Coastline into the sunrise Straining for the men to come To rescue the boats while they could. |
Change in direction
Yesterday the light- Ening was in the east but now Is instead the west Devoured by the horizons And the plum scented breeze. |
Bridge under troubled water
Trembling under The bridge, your arms get hea- vier the more you wait. |
Invisible Love
Even at midnight The waves climb the barriers Reaching to the stars |
A Study of Nothing
This is a poem about nothing. It is not a poem about the two women That walk their dogs around the cricket fields At 3.30pm every day at the back of me And constantly talk about great America Was back in their youth And now under Trump And who eventually gets in after him Will still leave a bitter like taste in the air. This is a poem about nothing. It is not about people Who are stood outside my train carriage On the way to my parents Minus masks and are saying The virus doesn’t exist And has never existed And was made up Just as a way to control us further. It has no shape or form And its meaning is endless Changing at whatever time of the day You decide to read it Whether on your phone Or graffiti painted under bridges Which may say one day Johnson is a god And the next is a two-faced punk. This is a poem about nothing. From going past towns And cities I have never visited On the train to work To going past polluted rivers Covered in the laziness Of companies who pour their sewage Into which without ever really thinking What they are actually doing. It is not about sitting in deserted Waiting rooms in the middle of A heavy snow storm Or sat there wondering if everything Will go back to the way it was And you will soon be fighting Like you used to get a seat Heading home every night. This is a poem that slips Into the simplest of patterns With the most minimum of fuss Whether you are sat there or not At your local water reservoir That is closed from general public viewing Who may see you there. This is a poem that is really about eternity Or after a while a whole series of nothings Offering no answer to Who is right or who is wrong And where you are heading next Recreating endings out of beginnings And spaced particles finally hoping together At the edge of a black hole. |
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