Poem's by Post

I was recently part of a project called Poem's by Post (through It's Not Your Birthday But...) that asked poets to respond to the life stories of residents at Royal Star & Garter nursing homes. These are homes for the ex-Service community, people with fascinating stories to tell. People who had been submariners, POWs in Stalags in Germany, flown in bombers over burning German cities. All with incredible histories. The project was an interesting way to keep the stories alive, reconnect with our own collective history. It was all organised by the poet Tom Mallander, a poet who wants 'to put on historical record information, before it slips out of historical memory.' Please look him up. He has a unique approach to poetry.

I have two poems in the book. Here are the ones that didn't make the cut.

Stalag dreams of blessed guests, tobacco rations smiling.

Leaking the logbook of guard movements, the Commandant’s 

cursive in the margins. Stalag dreams of quiet bunks & Khaki 

barbwire ribbons. Deceitful horses conceal currencies of dirt.

The forest hugs; Stalag dreams those early morning epics.

Tracking back towards the fence, listening for the worry of a tunneller, 

she turns an ear to the east. Fury is forming. All sport will conclude.

Stalag dreams of digging worms beneath her, larks tunnelling home.

George flipped, whipped his theatre seat, died in Polish sand.

An interruption……………….the goons…………..30 minutes notice.

………dogs…..whiteout…………..…boxcar vomit……excrement….

………………………….Moosburg………………………………………..

………………………………………………Slit trench rest………………

All Stalag’s dreams are hollow now… quietly filling voids…………

----------------------------------------------------------------

Living, despite the inky evenings, is surely the shrewder 

choice (granted, death is a lamb, keeps all the simple sins close), 

but to continue - despite the bony knuckles of employment & ego

endlessly pressing until your numb grin slips (yrself propped

up by gin and family patience) - that's the sunset stuff,

the gunship centre of yrself, the accurizing drift towards

a settled carriage, bounded by the results of your 

momentum (settled in yr whiskey slippers), memories collecting 

at your feet – trout tail curls in your box of photographs.

----------------------------------------------------------------

“The people we should have been seen dead 

with,” she said

the antifa

the headshrinker

VISA granting diplomats

funders of relief & rehabilitation

former PMs and ex-friends of Hitler himself

Heroes of the Holocaust

----------------------------------------------------------------

Listen to  w o r d s

do not understand 

anything

from the 

White Horse Valley

mucus field t r i b e

Saxon photo

E x c e. E.  d

rural riverssss

do not speak

simple statement

like foreign r a d i o

in the empty speaker

no speech

“…………

…………..”

carry out

synaptic mud

ohgodoh

tubes of foil, tubes ofoil

dragging thedirt of London

through themselves

filterschokeon fumes

fuckingup over &over again

is easy cometo the party, Henry

we have drink&drug neons ago

oh god ohgod ohgodoh

...data...

addiction to data

rag and progress

i see no skinned 

knees

in the achievment groups

evolutionary mismatch

between

environment & ancestors

homonims

hijack the reward pathway

A rabbit eating strawberries from a yellow bowl.

Lola is dancing 
in her one-piece blue pyjamas.
The sun is swatting parts of the room -
the shade bites into the glare, leaving blades of light.

The song playing is her favourite. 

She stands legs astride 
& sings a good guess at the chorus,
mangling half the words,
but it does not matter.

She is the glory in this morning.

We have completed a jigsaw 
for the first ever time
& it now lies on the floor 
like a forgotten masterpiece.

It is of a rabbit eating strawberries from a yellow bowl.

She arches over until
her head touches the floor
spreading her arms outwards
she holds this pose - it is impressive.

I implore her to take a bow & she acquiesces.

I'm playing all her favourite songs.
It is an intentional manipulation
I am not ashamed to admit committing.
& anyway, it generates joy for us both.

& what could possible be wrong with that.

We have spread a snowdrift of paper across
the living room floor, practising writing letters
and primordial poetry. 

& what could possible be wrong with that.

(then up and into everything the squall and the rest of it)

there was a part

(fruit-sweet)

of me

uncovered by the suck

           of your filling lungs

(the sound / lifting / breaking

/././.::o_) ) )  )  )  ) _ver  

                     

the white-tiled, bloodied room

(then up & into everything & 

the squall & the rest of it)

a part I will never squander

storks in the arteries

the rumbling
muscle underneath
the dip of fabric
that is my pocket


<...made me answer my phone, dumb...>


a parataxis 
of ligament & bone
a dislocation 
of sense from matter


<...it is unexplained, disconnected...>


an accident
an uncomfortable 
glide of cloth
& screen perhaps?


<...a dryness of hope, more likely...>


that way (east) 
there is Poland
& the pure blast 
of Russia beyond


<...extracting revenge, short-twitch on my thigh...>


a tremor in the leg
storks in the arteries
flightless birds, fish rotting 
in their blocked gullets


<...I am ringing, not the phone...>

The Scavengers of London out now in chapbook form.

The Scavengers of London out now in chapbook form. 

£3.50 from the excellent The Red Ceilings Press.

Have at it!

Fragments, scraps and off cuts of Scavengers

Plate VII. Male & female
cockroaches with egg-sac,
spiders’ webs, a cedar in
Highgate cemetery.

XII.

blue tit at coconut
unusual site of blackbird’s nest
this rookery too was deserted

Plate IV

XIII.

large horizontal branches
of the trees . ecclesiastical of birds
the jackdaw must rank

Plate V

XIII.

in the grounds
of the Zoo
- her normal clutch

Plate XI

XIII.

most ancient rookery sites
three cartloads of sticks
- hung on longer

Plate XII

XIV.

nothing zipped pass
the decaying notes of the moon
& its metres-wide
disintegration

of atoms.

The Scavengers of London eBook on The Red Ceilings Press

Read my new poetry ebook, The Scavengers Of London, for free, on the excellent The Red Ceilings Press.

Link straight to it here.

extract

flood of buildings. London’s
many little streams & flatlands
after the conquest of Waterloo

the metropolis sacrificed
engulfed by fruit & vegetables
the marshiness of much


woodcock & snipe
five fields till the middle
decaying stalks of the flowering rush


by the osier pond. A common
bird along a small hillock
instead of through a sewer

ones & zeros

underneath the wifi
deadening soil

sucking the internet
into ditches

all communications old
breaking across

the moment
           |
       / / | \ \


into waves of
ones & zeros
ones & zeros
ones & zeros

above the wifi
a greedy infinity

electronics
die in

coughing at the
black

[]]]]] ] ]  ]   ]    ]     ]

fading into
zero))) ) )  )  )   )   )    )    ) s

s p  a   c    e

                   s p  a  c   e

 "/ / : \ \ , , \ | / . . / / : \ \ . . ] { " } [ , . " | | \ . , { ] " 

e m  p   t   y

s n  o   w

library

first thousand rivers
coloured with milk
win first prize

then wonder how
thunder smashed
the mantlepiece

enough with joy
there are sadnesses
to eat and drink

the spine of the books
are yellow and lean
until lent to the elderly

underneath shelves &
chain of space. on the desk
aggression of paper clips

coldness of numbers

and grasp of division

the kiss of punctuation

Fragment of a scientific journal

] ...there in 1967 a professor of economics unintentionally caused his body to spin at over one hundred miles an hour by lifting his feet off the floor as he used his mechanical pencil sharpener. It was with that simple suspension of the laws of physics that the Yale Uncertainty pocket was discovered. Then nothing happened. Then something happened. The Yale Uncertainty Pocket 'disappeared for two months reappearing in the kitchen of a bungalow in Rotherhithe.' (Keane, 1968, pg.1455) The hunt was on to 'find the final resting place of the YUP.' (Brogan, 1969, pg.67) All of Yale's resources were directed into the research. Over 3,000,000 pencils were 'sharpened to studs' in over 2,500,000 locations around the university grounds. (Paul, Greene and Spent, 1971, pg.678) It was chaos... [

boy with the low laugh of a pigeon

method
experimental outline

boy with the low laugh
of a pigeon

inference
objective

boy with 3 coloured watches
pink
yellow
green

antagonised each other
again
worked well away from

bad influences 

apparatus

"i had a brother"
"i don't have a real dad"

results
conclusion

Fragment of The Scavengers Of London (& The Intervention Of Flora & Fauna)

whiteout poem #1

(shivering) blackout poem #4

blackout poem #3

blackout poem #2

blackout poem #1