Blog Archives

Chariots of War, by Mimi Grouse

27/10/2023

While women live their nightmares
And children lose their dreams,
And men who say their thoughts are right
Raise hell above the screams
Of animals and babies,
Of the dying and the maimed,
The speculators seize their chance
So the ignorant are blamed.
And while the world is overheating,
Fired up by bombs and flares,
The noble and the fearless
Tread where no-one dares;
Lights shining in the darkness,
Towers on a hill,
And the seething gods of violence
Can never break their will.

Highway West, by Sterling Warner

20/10/2023

Vagabond bards write about ovoid buds where roses
bloom—an anathema to deer but manger to worms
whose larva feed on under leaves. Slowly. Hidden.

Thumbing through maps creased & crisp
we search for lost highways beyond the scope
of GPS tracking & interstellar photography.

Curiosity lingers, anticipates private gateways
to emerge while standing on the scratch line,
jumping a starting pistol that may never fire.

Freeway nomads lacking grace and engineering,
we narrow our focus to roads far less traveled—paths
sans cell towers covered with leaves of uncharted pings.

Beyond the stopwatch measuring time, we blindly
roll forward on endless thoroughfares, race towards
checkered flags herald nowhere beginnings.

Elusion, by Mimi Grouse

20/10/2023

Beside a murky waterway,
Beneath a pewter sky,
With the cold breeze slicing through our clothes,
We watch the boats sail by -
Out towards the ocean,
Far beyond the bay,
To where whales sing their love songs
And the dolphins dance and play.

Let the Children Play, by Guy Fletcher

20/10/2023

Horror of war on TV screens,
pain etched on bloody faces,
one conflict after another
whilst in the park children run
free from such turmoil.
So on this beautiful azure day
let the children play, let the children play.

The old man struggles down the road
pausing at every few metres
whilst in the park children run
thinking only of the moment
but troubles will come soon enough
for in this nirvana they will not stay
so let the children play, let the children play.

The Day I Died, by Malvina Perova

20/10/2023

Hi, I’m from Ukraine and I died today, and every day after February the twenty-fourth.
I died on battlefields, the valleys and hills, where I was called to prove my worth.
I died in my sleep when the missile hit my bedroom in the middle of numerous nights.
I died in the van with twenty-one evacuees who lost their homes and then their lives.
I died with every burnt-down harvest, every poisoned dolphin, every broken tree...
I died so many times and only cos I wasn’t there, then, I may still be,
I may keep my cosy routines and hide behind the may-have-beens.
It’s only luck, a Russian bloody roulette, that it wasn’t me who fell.
But my people say, we die, die every day
For all who bid us farewell.

Again? by Robert Hunt

13/10/2023

Obstinate brother
your recent travail
elicits one word...
again?

Succor is offered
with knowing confidence
the intrusive malady
shall be vanquished.

Upon which
familial contretemps
may recommence...
amen.

Seaborne Adventure, by Jeremy Leariwala

13/10/2023

Peering out, at the busy fishermen,
Watching the racing objects plus weeds,
And admiring the floating-pecking seabirds,
The visitor noted the sudden changes yonder.

Unlike the past few hours,
When their speeding vessel had rattled,
Bumping onto violent waves,
The water surface was now calm & still.

‘Why? This part looks strange!’ He voiced.
‘The water surface, I guess?’ Asked the coxswain.
‘Yes, of course. There aren’t ripples or waves.’
‘Well, it’s always calm before a storm.’

Mother's Dagger, by Amie Orr

13/10/2023

Blades through ash
Where She
Once lay and gave
Unto us now

Steel, black
Ground down for
A hardened face
Only one goal has he
To pursue the great
A tree forgets his place

Pierce the dead and rise
For there is
Nothing for him, of her
Both lie among the blades
No change

Love Drug, by Robert Martin

13/10/2023

Ophelia, you twist my mind like a drug
You came on to me like a flood
Pasted my brain like a 45 slug
Then left me with nothing but mud
You were moonshine from a jug,
Left me with only a shrug
Now a corpse wrapped up in a rug
My love now dropped with a thud

To Die Like Caesar, by Robert P. Bishop

13/10/2023

Make my death swift,
like Caesar’s
when the knives came out.

A swift death is
a kind death.
It grants no time
for regrets or tears
or the humiliation
of pleading for forgiveness.

So let me die quickly,
lest I beg for a second chance
at life and love.

Sycamore Gap, by Guy Fletcher

13/10/2023

Editor's Choice

Guy's poem refers to a recent piece of wanton vandalism: a much-photographed tree near Hadrian'a Wall in the north of England was mindlessly cut down, to national outrage. A teenager and an adult have been arrested.

Before

After

The tree stood like a sentry by Hadrian's Wall
in a valley between two hills
for well over a century.
In winter it was adorned with snow
surviving countless northern gales
until with an act of senseless destruction
it was sawn through. Then the tree surgeons came
to cart away the once magnificent specimen.
Yes now the scene is forlorn,
just a memory only existing
in many thousands of photographs.
They will probably plant another tree
but we'll not see it grow to its full height
and admire its form... on a star-filled night.

To illustrate what we'll be missing, here's a little treat for you all.

Wild Swimmers, by Guy Fletcher

6/10/2023

The river meanders like a serpent
and on this serene summer's day
it is painted azure mirroring the sky
and green from trees by the banks.
He spots a heron searching for prey
but that's in limited supply
for the river's like a beauty
appearing perfect but with a troubled soul
for sewage is being pumped out,
poison from secluded pipes
with once plentiful fish perishing.
He used to swim here as a boy,
it saddens him so much he cannot bear to stay
knowing wild swimmers would be sick today.

A Remarkable Place, by Ana Marie Dollano

6/10/2023

It’s veiled in secrecy.
Occasionally it’s busy, fierce,
or wild. At other times
misty, chaotic and
most days— crazy.
Sometimes it’s breezy,
warm and bright,
at times evergreen, with flora
abounding. . .
thoughts of you

Numerology, by Michael Leach

6/10/2023

While tuning in
to ABC Classic 2
on a wintry afternoon,
I appreciate successive recordings
of Kats-Chernin’s ‘Wild Swans Suite No. 2’
& Chopin’s ‘Piano Sonata No. 2’.
Switching across
to Double J,
I pay attention to the studio version
of Radiohead’s ‘2 + 2 = 5’.
I’m left wondering whether these radio stations
or the Universe
are trying to say something more significant
or not.
Perhaps I’m reaching too far for (il)logical patterns
in this bittersweet chaos.

Brush Strokes, by Robert P. Bishop

6/10/2023

It’s the end when you
roll onto your side,
pull the blankets to
your ear and stare at the
blank wall.

Closing your
eyes doesn’t make the wall
disappear. The wall just moves
into your head and stays there,
empty and waiting, like life,
a blank canvas,
ready for the
artist to apply his brush.

Poetry

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