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Soldier, Sailor, Air Force, Dad

 

Soldier, Sailor – Air Force, Dad

 

 

          Life is like, well, I don’t know it,

It’s something that’s happening to everyone else and,

The walls become unbearable as time slips by,

 As slipping by is not my life,

But other people’s understanding of my existence.

 

I share this existence though and often

I find within my dreams a request,

A pr...

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Also by Noetic-fret!:

Relinquishing Pain | Death Row Town | A Candidate for Applause |

Gulf War

The Plum Tree

Outside in the forgotten garden   

blossom is falling from the old Plum tree

When, as a child My mother would make me

Pick up the plums In the sun,

That fell like autumn leaves 

 

I would Squash them into plastic 

  'KWIK SAVE' bags 

'Make sure you get them all'    

 She would often nag  And nag

. To the sound of the warrior wasp,

  Flaunting his trib...

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Gareth Mathias Plum Tree

a cautionary tale...

 

When young Adam fancied a fumble

He asked Eve to make him a crumble

The serpent said yes

Then Eve made a dress

And now to our doom we all stumble.

 

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To Care and Share (Chants from Walkabouts - 4)

Poem 33 of 230:  TO CARE AND SHARE 

(TUNE - IN THE KEY OF D MAJOR: 

D1 E1 F#3 F#2 G3 A1 A3 G2
G2 A1 B3 c#2 c#3 B1 B3 A2
D2 B2 B2 B1 c#3 c#2 B1 B3
D2 A3 A1 A1 A2-B3 A2 G2 G3
A3 B2 B1 B1 c#2 c#3 B1 B3
A3 B1 B2 B3 c#2 B2 A2 A3
D1 D1 B3 B2 B1-c#3 c#2 B1 B3
D2 A2 A2 A2 B2 A2 G2 G3
D2 B3 B1 B2 c#2 c#2 B2 B3
D2 A2 A2 A2 B2 A2 G2 G3

D1 D1 B3 B1 c#2 c#3 B1 B3
D2 A2 A2 A2 B2 A2 G2 G3
D1 ...

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🌷(1)

Also by David Franks: Walkabouts Verse:

Impressions of London in 1997 (Chants from Walkabouts - 5) | Just Subsist (Chants from Walkabouts - 6) | On Honeymoon! (Chants from Walkabouts - 7) | Your Salt Upon My Lips (Chants from Walkabouts - 8) |

He said

He stood and stared

at the socks in his hand.

She lay an arm accross 

her face.

He made to sit 

on the edge of the bed.

She moved her legs.

He turned.

She sighed

at what lay ahead.

He squeezed her foot.

She turned her gaze to him.

He said:

''We will make it through this day...''

 

words and foto T carroll

 

 

 

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Also by Tommy Carroll:

My loose checked tie |

Weeping heart.

My weeping heart prolapses into Heaven
Pure beings never dreamed of violence
Pervaded by the spirit of sunlight scapes
My weeping heart sighs for a choir of fertile songs 

Glass plagues in suburban woodlands
crowned nourishment of the senses
Miserable woman dressed in blueberry bridges
Foolish Queen! 

A thousand seahorse dreams
Among the gunshot spheres of white ribbons
...

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Also by Danny Metcalfe:

Child of the dyad moon. | For those who travel far. | Vigor. | Evening. | Efflorescence. |

Provisions August 1767

 Provisions August 1767

Bailing Twine    500 balls
One gross of Quarrels
An half dozen Halberds
Pouches (leather) a gross
A selection of Hafts, Shanks and Spindles
Pipes (musical) 4 sets (boxed)
Pipes (fumidore) 4 sets (boxed)
Broadcloth     14 ells
Meal    150 sacks
Oat    200 bushels
Seed for sowing
20 Scythes for reaping
1 Astrolabe
A Tumbril with straw
20 ca...

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Also by John Duffus:

The Armchair Critic | Temple of Fiddes | What Is A Goit? WOL Comp / Nonsense Verse | Terra Nostra | Terra Nostra |

lists

Tawny Bridge

Hell mithered an itch that day,
an automated path down to the river
where I found the bridge, a sulky spot
to sit and slink my limbs; a dripping prose
of adolescence that would never disappear.
By the grit of this – seeing my sore gluttony,
unconcerned by the fish below - 
 a stranger was spurred to share my seat,
...

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Also by Marianne Daniels:

Enter Violet | Portrait of Love on a Dove’s Tail | A Suggestion of Defence | The Hall | Catalepsy | Needle | The Candle Bends | Ghosts | She Reasons to Herself While Bathing | The Authentic Heart | Jude | Collective | Underneath | Coat |

There's Only One Jimmy White!

 

A popular snooker legend is receiving a testimonial this year, and I have penned this tribute to celebrate him... 
 
There's Only One Jimmy White!
b...

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Also by Alain English:

The Aberdeen Poems by Alain English |

LOVE'S NOT A WORD I CARE ABOUT

How can love cover the distance?

How can love manage the space?

The memory's a miracle worker

But it doesn't make up for your face.

 

For a lifetime you lived close by me

I saw you most every day

And I thought that you'd always be there

But suddenly you went away

 

You can't put a price on the life we knew

But when you left that life was through

E...

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Also by M.C. Newberry:

MERCHANT BANKERS | WATERBOARDING | LAST RESORT | THEY SAY - a vocal version - thanks Alan Hill! | HAVING IT ON HIS TOES | HOT STUFF | THE DEVIL'S DISCIPLE | THE PRIMROSE | STEAM DAYS | KNOWING THE DIFFERENCE | SUE - REMEMBERING A MUCH LOVED DOG | WORDS |

Defying Age

I, have always been

I, have always seen.

I, have watched the world

And seen its history unfurled.

 

I, shall always be

I, shall always see.

I, have watched my friends get old

But age dies not weary me, I’m bold.

 

I, am what I make myself

I, am what I want to be.

I, will not give in to time

The future is still mine.

 

I, shall go on an...

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going round the twist

 

 

my body knows its spiralling DNA

thoughts helter skelter down 

on this double helix of  evolution

 

my mind knows infinity is its home 

ideas  diffuse through the universe

thoughts expanding  with  the stars

 

a  journey through life

expectations collapsed

responsibility diminished

understanding illuminated

 

 

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Morning prayer

Go praise thou the Lord! It's seven o'clock!
You cannot afford to slumber ad hoc.
Five times you've hit snooze, and you've wasted an hour,
Forget your excuse, and go get in the shower.

Go praise thou the Lord! The prayerbook awaits,
its words unexplored, so get on your skates.
It stands on the shelf for the start of the day,
for Jesus himself rose up early to pray.

Go prai...

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Also by Marnanel Thurman:

Two creatures | Spanyel | Coincidence | And yet you show surprise | Some folk are born with knowledge of their goal | Among those born as humans on the earth | New ditty | Sleep | Pittsburgh | Dear Sir... | Stations | Acquainted with the dawn |

SNIPER

 

SNIPER

 

Sitting patiently atop his tree camouflaged

against the enemy, the sniper waits.

For three days and three nights he has waited

to do his duty for Imperial Japan.

Along the trail walks the enemy. Alert and ready

but not looking up, for this is where the sniper is,

waiting, watching, ready right now.

Levelling his gun, he takes careful aim.

T...

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Also by NICK ARMBRISTER:

poems i read at Rochdale town hall march29 | SWIM IN THE SEA | HOW FED UP | DYING PRETTY | FIGHTER PILOT | One with the Storm and new sea themed ebook link | LET SLEEP COMETH | HOW COME | AMERICAN MIGS | me live in the sandbar | OVER | CONVERT |

sniperimperial japan armyfar eastww2austrailiawarmendeath

I Admit I Am Ambivalent

Sidelines.  

 

I meet the compulsion

that leads me to write

in the burgeoning day

and the gathering night

and draw, from the wings

of a turbulent stage,

impressions that litter

the waste of a page.

 

 

Me and You.  

 

I've emptied pens in vain attempts

to tie a feeling to a line, and

sought the answer to the question;

do your f...

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Eesless

Lo, our sun now fills a wan sky

with such wondrous light.

This magic god-star brings us our warmth and joy

and, from on high, his mystic rays

pour through dark and scowling clouds.

 

Our thoughts will not accord him thanks

nor ask why our souls must always try to

climb out of a soft cocoon,

a warm and loving womb,

to gain an unknown star ( so cold, )

...

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Also by Yvonne Brunton:

My Violin (the Musician’s Tale 2 ) | I'd call it Tetractys but I can't Spell it | Daddy's Child | My Guitar | The Agropuss | Peace? | Wait for Weight | Message From School |

The Grey Clouds Loom

The grey clouds loom  The grey clouds loom  in the crowded night sky Where stars in the billions  Are born and then die The lightning flash The darkness' turn The rocks want to know What time has learned  The light

Read more …

A Trip to the Chemist

 

“We’ve singles and trebles and this 12 pack here

Means old men can use one each month of the year;

We’ve ribbed ones and ticklers, all colours and sizes

And ones that light up and are full of surprises

And this one’s a novelty, first that I’ve seen

Which on your completion plays “God Save the Queen”;

There’s Strawberry, Chocolate, Lemon and Mint

And even in Chi...

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Also by John Coopey:

Dear Marge | Talkin' Brown Ale Blues | Parallax 29 | Falling Glass | Stairlift to Heaven |

Looking Back

She said she loved me
and I waited around,
counting years and our children,
blowing kisses at pretty girls,
or anyone who walked by my door.

Its strange,
in that foreign country
I found it hard to write.

I used to dance
in the imagination of others back then,
used to love my little women.
I'd drink them in at 3am
with sea salt and lime.
They'd never know what hap...

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The Wheelie-bin Murder

 

He surmised it had been done

by a couple of teenagers

with a lit rag, although it was still

purely conjecture on his part

at this point.

 

Unfortunately for him, what was

evident was that his blue recycling-

bin had been full, so he had put the rest

of the newspapers and magazines

in the main one.

 

The flame caught, and the full thing

w...

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poetry

Agape ( A-gap-ay)

If we could imagine the love of one who loves men purely for their own sake, and not because of any need or desire of his own, purely desires their good, and yet loves them wholly, not for what at this moment they are, but for what he knows he can make of them because he made them, then we should have in our minds some true image of the love of the Father and Creator of mankind.

O. C. Quick

...

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O-U-S

 

Most of us find life difficult to avoid, in a way that I find quite curious Choosing the right path to follow at speed, makes some us quite furious The answers aren't easy, but O-U-S might just be a key It ain't the answer to life and everything - say “that's 42!” - I might agree    ...

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Also by David Lindsay:

Two Suns |

poetry

Your Space or Mine

The barren whitewashed walls won’t talk

in the absence of graffiti;

no scripture scrawled in paint or chalk,

no importunate entreaty

 

saying  meet me at The Nail Bar

on Saturday at half past two –

we’ll promenade the boulevard

like the gentle people do.

 

I’d write messages on buses

with my fingers in the dust

or the carts collecting rubbish

...

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"KRUNF!" Says The Fnurk

 

In the land of Scroodleflump, nothing works how you think.

Gruddles live in bongalodes, grass is the brightest pink.

Gruddles are slith and lanky, covered in purple fur,

Their bongalodes wood-built, when they’re sad they purr.

 

Mr. and Mrs. Gruddle are most stranculiar.

They scrunge and gruff about, their sproglet is Tulia.

Tulia has a stropple in the muddle o...

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Also by Lynn Dye:

The Glopsnork | Strange Ailments | Mothering Sunday Mk III | Mothering Sunday | Distant Friends |

nonsense comp

Acid Attack

 

Acid Attack

 

Seventeen, he saunters into the gents,

traces of a mate’s joke on his lips.

The two skulking men leer over shoulders

to appraise the boy’s threat.

 

Croaking Alright

as if pacifying a pair of dangerous dogs,

he selects the furthest urinal.

But they see the fumbled flies,

smell his sweat

hear his tachycardia and

 

slide ...

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Also by fiona sinclair:

The Room (revised) | ladies who lunch |

Happy Marriage

 

A little bit confused was beautiful Spring,

She had to choose for life a bridegroom.

Who would  give her a wedding ring?

Three suitors wanted to be her happy and bloom.

 

March, April and May vied with each other.

About their great love they quietly talked.

April was for Spring like a brother,

With March she just often liked to walk.

 

Timid March g...

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Also by Larisa Rzhepishevska:

The Formula of Love? | With Love Only | Fly Has Sat On The Sweetest Jam (nonsense comp) | In A January Morning (nonsense comp) | Cat Is Also A Chick (nonsense comp) | Smart Little Johnny (competition) | Once Upon A Time.... | March |

spring

Night Terrors

Night Terrors

 

 

 

 

In a corner of the yard

against moss-lined red brick

chimes dance

disturb

disorientate

 

Semi-conscious

straddling the mattress' width

I peep through

frayed-at-the-edges blinds

 

I witness nothing

yet catch sight of a figure

walking

down the ginnel

striding with intent

over centuries old co...

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Night sleep terrors fear

WHEN ONE NIGHT I DREAMT' I SLEPT.

When one night I dreamt’ I was sleeping
My eyes shut, my heart barely beating.
I lay, and lay reclined and reposed,
In depths nocturnal. In sleep, I supposed!
Then on and on, I lay again
Waiting for the dawns refrain.
Till it struck me through my calm
I had missed my stark alarm!
But on I lay, as one with my bed,
And dreamt’ I slept.
Or was I dead?

 

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Also by Peter Asher:

Poem for childern | Meles Meles | Found Poem |

Androgynous (him and her)

Obsession once derived from love

love forbidden, not given

Failed release of endorphins, please be my drug My morphine

DisAmbiguity! Confusion, Love me and make love to me. 

An ambiguous form of possessiveness,

When distance prevails, fondness created,

Love and fondness mating, intercourse of words and feelings

Distance makes the heart grow fonder

 

Life fall...

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Then

Back then

the pen had joy to bring

in seven year fingers.

Each word a smile brought forward

the broadest of futures.

 

Light shone through

gaps in the beat of the rhythm

but it never mattered

because I was writing.

 

The world was enormous.

Space opened up in large doses

and everything meant more than just form.

 

Come back through the...

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Also by Kealan Coady:

25 Million Seahorses Killed For The Greater Good | Gallile | The Quiet Conveyer Belt | They The System | Raft | Future Smut For Cardboard People | Like A Child In A Bath Of Knives | A Priest For Our Time. | Thank Fuck | 12 The Research Institute Of Radical Genetics | Radio Warning | 11 The Imaginator | Cute Slum Chick Jelly | 10 Anti Demagogy | 9 Lov |

CANVAS

 

 
Before my eyes brilliant colour, perfection
Dancing gracefully in every direction,
The world of trees, the art of nature
Are simple reasons for a painter.
 
The power mother nature can release
Could make a painting, a masterpiece
A gallery of natures finest hues,
Enough to stir the most reluctant muse.
 
Should mother nature tutor me in art
...

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Captain of the Rant vs. Hair Explosion's new EP, 'Nudges, Whispers and Threats' now available for free download!

Hello there!

Just a quick update. Captain of the Rant and Hair Explosion have finally finished off their latest EP, 'Nudges, Whispers and Threats', and now it's available for free download from here.

Our last EP, 'No Copyright Necessary', was called a "beautiful and resonant work" by Big Wheel Magazine, and it got great responses elsewhere.

Anyway, I hope you enjoy our latest instal...

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captain of the ranthair explosionspoken wordelectronudges whispers and threats

Forlorn

 

Bring me someone new fast

 

No wait,

Bring me someone who is fast

and maybe together we can fall 

through these sleepless nights

like stars that burn out,

we will slip awkward, as we dip

fluttering like ash

we will darken the summer sky

filling it with heavy grays and whites

 

 We will become a flash of tumbling embers,

just built to spi...

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Also by BT:

Chrysalis | Krilian Photography | Vertigo # 2 | Vertigo #1 | Don't Forget | These Days | Fire | Postcard Perfect | Green Grass | It Rhymes |

free versefound wordexperimentalfree form

ThePoetry Spoke Open mic poetry- Guests John Coopey and Alan Ainsworth

'ThePoetry Spoke'

Great poetry and acoustic music night-

This Tuesday Night 27th March- doors open 8pm!

 

La Gondola

22a Liscard Crescent

Wallasey- The Wirral

CH44 1AE (a stones throw over the Mersey from Liverpool)

Check us out in the gig guide...

 

Our Guest Poet

 

WOL's very own Yorkshire Bard!  'John Coopey'

John's poetry is; Metrical, no...

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Also by Chris Co:

Wirral Ode Show open mic poetry night. |

The wind of the wivering woggeldy woo

 

When the wind of the wivering woggeldy woo
came prowling the village of Kamchatkaroo,
it wiggled and sniggled and squeezed its way through,
and the whispers it glummoxed were steely and blue,
in the silve of the salvering sun,
by the silve of the salvering sun.

It ricked and it rocked and it renneled around,
the houses all filled with inquantible sound,
as it cunningly r...

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Also by Jim Stewart-Evans:

Haven't you got one of those? |

nonsense comp

Renewal

`

 

 

 

There must be a death
if there is to be a resurrection;
The demise of something
in part or the whole of:
that portion of one's being...
Only then shall we see
with eyes new as morning's first light.
Only then shall we have
reinvented ourselves:
allow ourselves to take the first steps
laden with amnesia
of the former, forgotten self.
Come and cease...

Read more …

Renewalresurrectionreinvention

Arise Sir Pain

 

Arise Sir Pain, for it must be time you smote me again,
maybe I've had too many days out of the sun and the rain,
some change in the 'fluences that drive my pen to shriek,
will bend the moods I can portray & themes that I then seek.
 
Yes today a challenge is welcomed despite the ruptured peace,
tensioned tranquilities having their fevered needs to be released,
...

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Also by Dave Dunn:

When I Wake... | Inseparably | The Velvet Covers | Disparate Friends |

PainHumanitydeath

TOWARD SLEEP

 

 

Eyes closed

…So soon?

How quietly you breathe,

How slight

The gentle rising of your breast.

Swiftly indeed

The insistent urging of desire

Has succumbed

And,

Docile now,

Rocks

In her peaceful bay.

 

Outside

The trees

Are absolutely still.

And motionless

Wide continents of cloud

Have hidden the moon.

Somewhere

...

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The Disappearance of John J. Dyer

 

The Disappearance of  John J. Dyer

(another try at this one)

 

Mr Dyer, in rainbow shorts, plump

and pink under a palm tree, smiles

as he pats Miss Burtenshaw’s rump,

golden grains of sand on the beach

flowing through his open fingers.

 

Soft over rooftops a lullaby’s heard

as Dyer dreams of the one-armed bandit

in the back bar of  his favourit...

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Also by Nick Coleman:

One Night Stand | The Heron | Re-written Red-eyed Steer |

sunday snow

 

sunday snow

on the

ground

 

a log eyed

companion

burns

 

to

  my

     door

           no

             beaten

                      path

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Also by Glyn Pope:

changing a fuse |

Tea Party In A Fox Hole

Photograph by Michael Nichols

Tea Party In A Fox Hole

I'm enrolled albeit fictitiously

In the School of Udhra

Committed at last to philosophy

Expressed by Udhrite School

Of poets who

"When loving die"

A Bedouin tradition and

It’s complaints

Of singleness and unrest

Of union and disunion

Dogon avatars carry

Duende through the ages

And I ...

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Fox HoleJ. Otis Powell‽Love is hippopotamusLove with ugly in itMichael NicholsTea Party

Tide Turn

A full moon, and the tide swollen by rain;

Rain lashing on the window, wild as rage -

My pen is stirring on the unspoilt page

In scribble circles, feeling round this pain.

 

Like tunnels leading deeper than my mind,

Or ropes in hopeless tangles, loosely curled,

Sprawling intestines looped around the world

My pen describes; this pain is ill-defined.

 

The ...

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Also by Freda Davis:

Five Thirty am |

tidemoonmoodsPainChange

ANTICIPATION

And there he stood. Waiting.

No-one even noticed

That he was crying, silently,

In the middle of a crowd.

Carefully, so that no-one could see.

In a dream. Fear. Too many

People. Cheering silently,

And no-one had a care in 

The world. But he was afraid.

In that moment in time. If

Only they knew, that it's a

NO, but thank you.

 

Read and leave comments (5)

Also by Nicky Burrows:

(untitled) |

The City

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I am on a crowded

city sidewalk,

the crowd sgueezes,

shoves and pushes.

Like blood through

a too small artery.

 

Claustrophobia threatens

to swallow me.

A small opening appears,

I rush to it. But it quickly

fills in and once again,

the crowd squeezes, shoves

and pushes.

 

I reach my desti...

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Also by Shirley Smothers:

Altars to the Gods (With better illustration) | Altars to the Gods |

claustrophobiathe citycrowds

A Lifetime in Tesco

I'll walk across the desert two years and a day

I'll drive down the M4 the opposite way

I'll happily fight with a big pack of wolves

I'll dive head first at some big randy bulls

I'll run around naked in Afghanistan

I'll piss in the hat of a policeman

I'll swing at Joe Pesci with relative ease

I'll even vote Tory if you so please

But whatever the trouble, whatever...

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Also by Jack Pascoe:

FONY 2012 | Skins is Getting Cancelled!!! | Johnny Was A Rudeboy | Here in Devon | Don't Take Yourself So Serious |

Jefferama Opens at Bolton’s Gothic Drop Inn

Silhouetted against cold and darkening skies the vast Victorian monolith known as Brooklyn threw open its weathered creaking doors to a small band of foolhardy poets brave enough to enter.

The nervous throng of poets and musical wannabes were invited into what was once the master’s sumptuous bedchambers, sadly long neglected. Forgiving the backdrop of attic trivia and old bikes, one could n...

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Also by Gus Jonsson:

When Neptune Filled His Boots (Nonsense) |

Zombies

First draft and unfinished. A bit stuck with it, to be honest :( Feedback/critique welcomed: 

 

14th March 2012

 

The first thing I did was go and sit on the sofa so I could see the pictures. It was important to get as much information as possible. My lukewarm, milkless tea splashed on my shaking fingers.  It had spread pretty quickly;  no one seemed to know where the epidemic s...

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Trev's Texas Tour 2012 (The run up)

Yes once again it's across the pond to America another poetry tour, this time solely in Texas, once again I hope to record it in rhyme. I fly out on April 3, this time instead of waiting till I go before writing I have already started at various stages of prparation as the inspiration took me, hence the title. The poems have no title but the date they were written and comments in (italics and brac...

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Also by Trev the Road Poet:

Trev's USA Tour 2011 | Trev's USA Tour 2011 | Trev's USA Tour 2011 | Trev's USA Tour 2011 | Trev's USA Tour 2011 | Trev's USA Tour 2011 | Trev's USA Tour 2011 | Trev's USA Tour 2011 | Trev's USA Tour 2011 | Trev's USA Tour 2011 |

Headshot - OpenMind LGBT Special piece

A cum stained victory for the avant-garde,
throw away your cameras
and embrace the lens of the soul.

Prettiness does not define talent.
How can a stoic face define the myriad of human emotions?
A lifeless motif of the status-ho.

Individuality seeps like semen upon a blood stained carcass.
Trickles of truth, like tears upon a false-face.
One cannot spell life without l...

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Also by Ushiku Crisafulli:

Queer Terrorists - Collab with Brownie for OpenMind LGBT Special |

OpenMindLGBTBidamanAvant-GardeSexuality

Mavis

Now available in Issue 23 of Sprout Online Magazine

http://www.sproutonlinemagazine.com/

 

Read and leave comments (10)

Also by Laura Taylor:

Tickling Fish | Truth or Dare | The Jester |

Show more entries …

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