Saturday, May 23, 2015

Adam Ward


 

Star-spangled cylinders

Let’s fight Western style:
dominance from a distance
missiles without empathy.

Gravity doesn’t look
to see if Newton is waiting
under the apple tree.

Star-spangled cylinders
don’t care if the streets
are filled with guns,

or women clutching hands
with a sugar-smiling child,
or a father buying toys.

I would like humans
with less discrimination,
and bullets to have more.
 
 
 
The simplest of things
 
Don’t build a palace with marble and gold.
Begin with the music that feathers the breeze,
or the bicycle-bell of a wine glass toast.
 
Knead clay made of warm days on the grass,
and the sun’s lemon-light massaging your face.
A clammy clench of hands on a picnic blanket.
 
Let the foundations sit upon Sunday lunches,
the crescendo of Christmas crackers,
the falling cadence of a goodnight kiss.
 
Decorate the hall with the smell of burnt toast,
paint the walls with rouge cheeked grandchildren
as they pour sand from their shoes.
 
Furnish the room with morning-breath snores,
the bubble wrap clatter of rain against the window,
and the sky spat lightning you watch from a veiled room.
 
Tile the kitchen with the sizzle of a camera flash,
laminate the floor with the glossy prints,
plaster the red-eye to your walls.
 
It’s not the ring on your finger that matters.
but the circular band that your lips make,
when you shape the words: I do.
 
You can read it for yourself: Adam Ward is one of the top poets publishing in the UK small press right now, and it's a pleasure to have him back on the top UK small press poetry site. (Well, if you don't speak up for yourself, who will?) Find Adam's page on Facebook if you want more delicately nuanced sensory thrills and wordery.
 
 
 

Sunday, May 17, 2015

Bryn Fortey

Bryn Fortey has had a lifetime's involvement with words. One time editor of Bruce Hodder's favourite poetry magazine, OUTLAW, (it's true! Bruce),
a family tragedy forced him away from writing for a number of years before circumstances allowed him to return. The Alchemy Press
published MERRY-GO-ROUND, a mixed fiction and poetry collection of his work, in 2014.
 

ELVIS AND I
 

 

Cardiac arrhythmia
(Irregular heartbeat to you)
     Tick
Enlarged heart
(His by 50%, mine just a little)
     Tick
High blood pressure
     Tick
Short of breath
     Tick

But I was never the avatar of cool
Nor become a figure of bloated excess
(Well not to the same extent)
I have far outlived his forty-two years

A musical snob at first
I danced to his rhythms in secret
Before acknowledging his heritage

Janis Martin sang: 'My Boy Elvis'
But he belonged to the world
And tears were shed around the globe
On the day he died

The King of Rock and Roll
Fat with junk food and prescription drugs
Pyjama bottoms round his ankles
Dead on his toilet floor

With my list of medical 'ticks' in mind
I am in and out of my 'smallest room' real fast
Knowing that one day the strain
Might be too much for my heart as well


Bryn Fortey


THERE, THE SONGBIRD


I am the Captain
Of this vessel

I set the sail
And plot the course

You would lose
Should we wrestle

I am the master
Of brute force

The Sea
The shore
The orange skies

A songbird dies
For lack of grace

Space, the killer
Dark assassin

There the seat
The pilot sat in

There, the songbirds
Strangled face



Bryn Fortey 
 


 



 

Friday, May 01, 2015

Jono Bell


 
 
Pamphlet of lies

 

We've been here for ages

Working zero hours for minimum wages

Just too weary to turn the pages

To your pamphlet of lies

Saw you on a television debate

Telling us who to fear and hate

You covered everyone in my community

All the angels on my estate

We've been here for ages

Zero hours,minimum wages.

We got some angry sisters here

Who wanna make a mess of you

 

Fools will vote for liars

Jokers govern and lead

Crack the whip on so called austerity

Only the poor and disabled bleed

And if you dare come to my estate

 With all your fake airs and graces

We got people at the food bank here

Wanna make a mess of you

We've been here for ages

Zero hours,minimum wages.

And we will burn all the pages

To your pamphlet of lies

 

 

Ignorance,fear and bigotry

Dance to your propaganda tune

But you see we are many

Community won't fade away it's stronger than you.

We've been here for ages

Zero hours,minimum wages.

And we will burn all the pages

To your pamphlet of lies
 
 
Jono Bell is the Jono in Jono & The Uke Dealers. He also plays in the 2 Tone Ska Band. This is a song the Dealers are working on which stands up exceptionally well as a poem.