~~~~~~~~~~~~ (the poetry) WORM ~~~~~~~~~~~~ 29

Walking to Hilbre

Grandad, you wake forgetting
that we ever walked to Hilbre,
the sand ridges hard under our bare soles,

the advancing tide filling the valleys.
When we reached the sandstone island, we ate
tongue paste Hovis sandwiches, crusts trimmed

by Nanna, thermos coffee, her dark date loaf.
The sand's today empty of us. Your gold puzzle ring
glints in the morning sun. A sandfly annoys

the diamond panes of the leadlight window.
Oh, but now I'm being forgetful: a plain
picture window now, the preference

of Olive, your new wife. And I'm that fly
attacking the glass. My complex eye
sees everything and nothing.

I run through the waves
trying to reach you; the tide
of memory keeps us apart.

© Christopher T. George

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untitled

Cyclists pass from shadow into sun
and into shadow. Birds expound unseen
the meaning of the end of a perfect day.

No issue to this day but melody,
and clasp of hand on shining nothingness;
yet was it all a lie?
A lie's finesse
between us and the news that we must die.

© Ernst Kipling

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Remembered Wings

Year after year their timing was the same.
As early summer took the place of spring
my swallows came, and briskly gathering
would breed, then raise their young and so proclaim
hope’s renaissance. Each darted sharp as flame
between the earth and sky, remembering
old haunts, despite long miles of wandering.
This year I waited but they never came.

© David Anthony

Torrey Pines Beach with Sketch Pad

Braving sea birds perched on brows of cliffs,
it scuttles along in solitary odyssey –
a jerk and turn likened to a clot of kelp
entrapped in eddies along the sandbar’s toes.

Autumn sunset sharpens crayons in the sky.
A pelican soars overhead, eyes probing the sand.
The crab curls into a dollop of shell, holds
motionless. The pelican flies on.

© Fred Longworth

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Not Three, Not Wise, Not Men

The members of the church council concur:
the three kings weren't all men, nor three, nor wise.
But what about their gifts? Those reek of guys!
What woman would bring gold? Frankincense? Myrrh?

If one had been a woman, perhaps two,
would they not have brought things like bath salts, soaps,
a terry cotton blanket, toys on ropes,
fresh lillies of the valley, or shampoo?

Of course they would. There simply is no doubt.
I'm writing to the council right away.
I hope the priest that deals with it is gay,
a rebel choirmaster with some clout.

Gold, frankincense, and myrrh? That just can't be.
Some nappies, small blue jammies, and potpourri.

© Geertjan Wielenga

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Violinist in Red

curls the air
bow scissoring bridge and back,
her notes dancing a precipice of song
and silence, a fringe skirted tonight,

the tears swallowed over curls refusing
a ribbon, fears cradled for one
whose mirror denies

her palette of reds:
the blush of roses she’ll clasp,
the flares of a woman spurning the margin

 © Julie Damerell

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Blood Oranges in Spring

Like Botero's women,
plump with dimples --
an orotund sunset gathering.

My eyes grow accustomed
to windows, observing
fruit fall on grass.

Since the slip downstairs,
my wrinkled ankle has bloated
to sanguinello beauty.

The hired gardener comes daily
to tend my flowers, a stillborn
loneliness on his lapel.

Twice now, he has left two
ripe-red orbs on the porch bench
like a humbling confession of love.

© Arlene Ang

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Paschal Lamb

The prelude to communion spoke of His pierced side,
the mutilation of His hands and feet.
A woman was crying beside me.
After worship I asked "why the tears?"
She answered, "I once lay on white sheets
and dreamed my breasts were sliced
into a sterile bowl."

After lunch we walked the lake's shore, napped
in a haystack; a lazy sun warmed our retreat;
I eyed her body as Abraham may have regarded Isaac.
In evening's half-light we emerged naked
on the magenta beach. I marveled at the gentle folds
sculpted between the sutures.

© Alan Wickes

 Barcelona won Best Sonnet award in the Ware Poets competition, 2004

Trotsky's Move

He took his usual place in the artists' cafe,
in a city centre side street where he often played
with remaining castles, bishops, in classic battle.
And kept an eye on the weather, and the door.

Later in the game his local opponent might gesture
towards the papers hung like battered sails
among flared matches, coffee steam, cheeroot smoke:
'Old news, Herr Trotsky.' Pluck out early pawns.

'Your move.' A stopped watch on the writing hand,
still tentative towards kings, slight tightening of eyes
beneath health issue glasses. Watchers stilled,
sensing old menace and appetite for cleansing.
Those orders: theory turning towards machine guns.

Outside it began to snow, muffling the rattle
and clang of trams: 'Here in Vienna, like
your Moscow we make good winters!' He would leave
after a schnapps for the cold, returning nods,
squinting through swirling flakes in powdered lamplight
in case of strangers; wary of whiteness, ice.

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grey child in a jar

suspended

in liquid

eyes

unopened

fists

grasp nothing

umbilical cord

cut


a scholar

gave you a string

of black seed beads


you wear them still

© Christina Fletcher

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Sabonaan' bantabami (Hello my children)

1. Main Road

The Headmaster furls his bicep to his boy Lekker's head,
Lekker who has his history inked into his wrists,
lines darker than his given sibling's lips,
Hopeful, 11,
Promise, 8,
2 of 9,
Ma Gogosikole's (housemistress, 16 years).

'What are they called?'
'Natal Wild Bananas'
Hopeful raises his hands,
'Look. Level. Like this.'
Hopeful stands to attention,
Hopeful takes the tray of young Strelitzia nicolai,
Hopeful carries his cargo like the crown jewels,
brow darker than this given treasure's stems,
thinks mild metal bananas mild-mannered bananas.

'Yebo, bahambani?
Nishaya idamu nomanishaya utshani na?' *
Promise raises her chin,
'No thank you'
Promise turns on her strops,
Promise hides behind her Headmaster's hands,
Promise smiles at the new boy on the pavement,
eyes lighter than her given father's face.
'we're gardening.'
thinks no thank you nearly always the right answer.

They march down Main Road,
Lekker beats his arms in a tattoo,
Hopeful guards his box of wild banana pups,
Promise drills herself to be a beauty queen,
Headmaster marshals his ears to rank her words
above the warm, salted, pounding Indian Ocean surf.

(*'Hello, where are they going? Are you going to swim or are you running away?' )

2. Caba

Dr, who this morning pronounced two men dead
from stab wounds to the heart,
who this afternoon lanced a bus driver's boil on the roadside
with a biro dipped in whiskey,
Dr who cooks his chosen sons and daughters
steak and gin supper on Thursdays,
strips to his underpants.
'Araucaria araucana - where the bamboo was,
Heliconia stricta Huber - there,
Strelitzia nicolai - between me and the neighbours'
Dr steps into his sandals.
Dr steps into the rain.
Dr takes up his trowel to plant his monkey-puzzle tree,
thinks God's garden never got so good.

Rain drips from his eyebrows.
He addresses his household on the stoep,
'Promise, will you take a nap,'
'Hopeful, will you take your medicine,'
'Lekker, will you take these amagceba off my hands.'
Rain drips from his eyebrows,
each drop a sponge soaked with the Dr's orders.

Lekker, on his haunches, spells out a line of wildepiesang.
Lekker prints his lettered fingers on the ground,
Lekker writes down the roots with his thumbs.
Lekker reads the leaf mould,
a musk softer than his given skin's rain-given lustre,
thinks perfume of beforehand.

Rain brims over his chin.
His tattoos speak in tongues.
'This black rose the day I joined the Navy.
This burning bird the day I smoked opium.
This blue lizard the day I stopped.'
Rain brims over his chin,
each drop a universe of roses, birds, lizards, leaves, earth.

(Caba: Zulu ideogram meaning to land softly; to give out small pieces of food; to fall like gentle rain)

© Matt Williams

Grade Book

Judas swings from a locust tree
like a Halloween skeleton.
Dawn splashes across eastern sands,
against thirty silver pieces
scattered below his feet.

Demons perch, a murder
of crows. They cackle traitor, traitor,
a chorus supported by the backbeat
of leather wings.

My hand cups a bag of Hershey's
Kisses, a reward from Principal Friedman
for delivering him Jared Caradini
after he buried Ms. Levoy's
grade book under second base
so she couldn't finish our report cards.

During recess, no one plays with me.

Illuminant

Inside, in air-conditioned half-light, we whisper
wide-eyed before a glimpse of Eadfrith's God.
Each word a wound on Satan's body.
This is shock and awe.

Outside, and the same hand has not been idle.
Jets cross-carpet the sky, each initialling
flawless lapis lazuli. London stretches, sighs.
And there is more, much more.

© Matt Merritt

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She found her name inconvenient, whispered sweet
nothings, her tongue close to my ear-- all the ghosts
living inside her turned the night cool gray,
any ideas of an alias had long crept out the door.

I am her sculpture with chipped mouth, glazed eyes--not ready to
listen, not ready to have the bits of my life swept under
her bare feet. Everything she said was as if I were standing
in front of her shadow, my thoughts overrun by the sound
of her breath against my cheek; Hope Sandoval in the background
the window open, maybe broken. How do you love me?
she says, then turns away with a Peruvian look in her eye.

I will wait for the next god to pin rain on cobblestones, listen
for the beat of wings against the sun-- it will be a warning and a sign
all at once. Take your time she whispers.

© Alex Stolis

( Vanity Fair : Editor's Choice of Cheryl Snell,' This poem displays sly mystery and lyricism. The sound and shape of the words detail images

that catch the innuendo beneath evident meaning.'Peruvian look' indeed! I'll never look at glossies the same.' )

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He said he liked it when my black
hair floated across his face.
I liked that he said it, moved in.
The carnival came to town
with irresistible neon lights
and the funhouse.

Bright nights summoned.
Burly carnies attracted me
with hoarse voices,
mouths that tasted of sticky cotton candy.

I discovered my sexual carte blanche,
wielded it like a Visa card.
My power was indiscreet.

I felt my way around
the glass rooms with their musky odor.
Forgot him while frolicking
with the images.
Mirrored reflections became pliable
when I flattened my palms against them.
Under my touch
they flexed for me,
were fondled, groped.

I was caught
in a throbbing
strobe of light.
He grew silent,
I felt stifled.
Morning stole the flashy night,
took the carnival.
I dyed my hair purple
to match the past
I left him.

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Men at Thirty

Men at thirty have grown shy about their bodies,
take up volley ball, or jogging,
smile indulgently at all the sexy teenies
they're bored with ogling.

The poets write a poem about being thirty.
They talk about Bachelard and Baudelaire
with the Older Women
They were rash enough to love at twenty-four.

They want a Serious Relationship.
They're learning tact.
The rest investigate insurance plans
or some other responsible act.
There's something earnest in their vests,
their keyrings, their hats.

Whatever past they've had seems somehow wrong.
Another century, another name
might have been better. Sometimes at evening,
watching the stars come out, they stand a moment longer

in the doorway, trying to remember
what year it was when last they made a wish.
One walks inside to the closet
and looks down at his football gear, gone stiff.

Another, before the mirror,
tilts his head a bit to catch the light
along his temple. What do women wish for?
Is it time to think about a child?
Can it be possible he's going bald?
At thirty he is almost halfway . . . where?

(Men at Thirty: Editor's Choice of M.A.Griffiths,' A wise and wry poem. Ah, the football gear, gone stiff ! The ease with which the author plays with the rhymes and the form makes it seem easy, but we know better, don't we...?' )

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Not Hot

Forgetting that I'm fat now, I still flirt
with clerks, mechanics, postmen. I can't seem
to get it through my head that I'm past thirt--
oops, forty this October. I still beam
unconsciously at cops' reflecting shades
and say things like, "Hel-LO there, officer,
my, aren't you tall!" For all us washed-up jades,
inside, are still the babes that we once were.

I get a lot more tickets now, instead
of finger-wagging warnings; and in place
of lively smiles, I get the living dead:
the clerk with no expression on his face.
My ego, though, survives with each new wrinkle;
it's they, not I, whose eyes have lost their twinkle.

© Rose M. Kelleher

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Acknowledgement:

Blood Oranges in Spring previously appeared in Creations Magazine (2004).

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Author's contact details:

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