He’d three lines and a gleaming neck,

stank of Imperial Leather.

I was gagged and tidemarked,

the Mother of the Messiah.

Under strict instruction

I smiled beatifically

with muted mouth, and purple feet,

in Bethlehem, in Primary.

Virgin Mary, Mother of God.

Silenced, made to breed.

But Joseph (famous cuckold)

was worth three lines of speech.

K...

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Tin to mouth

Tin to feet

One jig to reel

enough to eat

Is he broken, broke, breaking

on the pavement by the station?

Is he played, paid, playing

to his own tune or to yours?

Tin to mouth

Tin to feet

Two jigs to reel

enough to eat

Do you jingle jangle shillings

in your pocket as you’re walking

past the tinsmith making

all the magi...

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stealing pieces of experience

to place them just outside of your own

j                                

            i

              g

            s

            a

            w

         y     our

semiotic symptom

of a need to reproduce;

connote two-tone heartbreak

tragedy ripped

from a 2D playground

second-hand realities

suck on r...

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Shares fall,

brought low;

lying little Tesco.

Top guys?

Porky pies!

Jackanory stats.

Imaginary futures,

greedy little…

Tesco, uh oh!

Pants on fire.

Tongues as long as a telephone wire.

Cashflow fiasco;

Pinocchio noses.

Standardised carrot size?

Shove it

where the sun don’t…

Tesco swing low,

all fall down.

All the credibility

o...

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Ah Winter, you beast!

With your frosticle mornings,

your quiversome evenings,

your sod-it-let’s-whack-on-the-old-central-heating’s,

how I do dread your draughty blue fingers.

I shiver from Autumn to Spring.

Atchoo!

However,

my belly?

She loves you,

so much, so munch.

My fill-me-quick,

stick-to-ribs,

multi-carb monster-meal

pudding-enveloping

w...

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In this corridor of song,

invocations colour space

now devoid of human voice,

as spirits whisper here

of hysterical imprisonment;

of torture painted pink and blue

and baa baa black sheep have you any

                                                              Hail Mary full of grace

Supplications resonate

in hidden mouths

as mournings cry to sing of l...

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Not old enough to vote or wed

or give consent,

but old enough to be transferred                   

by men to men;

possessed.

Not old enough to drive a car,

have overdrafts or credit cards,

but old enough to be exchanged;

expended;

property.

Not old enough to live alone or own a home,

but old enough to be deceived;

to be perceived as third and four...

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crouched

quiet in the crackling grasses

hidden

listening to clouds swell heavy

ready

waiting for the judgement hour

of cutting

scythed where the ears can’t hear you

running

trusting steel to complete this

sowing

now that the earth lies sanguine

sodden

drip drop rinse and release your

sin...

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Commended in the Mother's Milk Writing Prize 2015.  Judge's comments:

What a rare joy it is to see understatement used as it is in ‘Ward 3D’. This is also an example of ‘showing not telling’, too, and all the more powerful for that. We are never told that the child had a difficult relationship with his/her parent, that the parent is dying or that the child (now grown up) is struggling to s...

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Mr Martlew

would you mind

if I sit awhile here

in the shade on my own,

you hushed in your hole,

in the valley of the shadow?

Shall I re-draw life

in the black lines etched above your bones?

Did it hurt?

Were you scared?

Do the stones weigh heavy?

Do they creak beneath the roses

and the green glass gravel?

Did it hurt?

Were you scared?

Were you read...

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Mr Martlew

would you mind

if I sit awhile here

in the shade on my own,

you hushed in your hole,

in the valley of the shadow?

Shall I re-draw life

in the black lines etched above your bones?

Did it hurt?

Were you scared?

Do the stones weigh heavy?

Do they creak beneath the roses

and the green glass gravel?

Did it hurt?

Were you scared?

Were you read...

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Ferris ocularity,

observing holy motion,

facilitates the weaving

of an elemental web.

Cirrus drips precipitate

a waving,

all devoted to rotation,

sewing oceanic lace

and braiding rain

to brine the breeze.

Pleasure seeks a penny slot

as bed and breakfast tongues

lick the candy cane locale.                                                            ...

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I wanted you right from the start.

As soon as I saw you, all shiny and showing,

inquisitive shimmerings leapt in my neurons,

grew fast and furious, battering synapses,

crashing through cortices,

carrying fire.

Bewitched! A thousand fantasies sparked and swirled in frontal lobes.

You shifted shape from mind to page,

drew me in, singing from a sheet I thought we sha...

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Hacked from an alphabet,

words watch themselves being dragged

broken-legged

over war-torn vellum.

His prime now savaged

by the Sword of Orl Tyme,

the bitter skald depletes the seeds of Eden.

Withered fingers bruise upon a page

inked venomous

with echoes of a breath

hiss-thin                                                                                ...

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Spots. Blind.

Stage high.

Steps to side.

Remember that.

Mic low, must adjust.

Swivel up, screw, twist?

20 steps to public eyes.

Will they listen will they like will they heckle will I die?

Will I fly fall trip cry choke spit cough?

Stammer stutter wobble sweat tic burp boff?

Extraordinarily urinarily anxious.                        

A pint to pass th...

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The net drips contempt

for a chicken

tied to sing in his teens;

from nothing out of nowhere,

unaware and unprepared.

Damaged

by the jagged

little splinters

made of gilt.

Contractually paid to play,

and play;

to play,

and play

again;

to make the pay his mother never could.

Brains of Braun - chicken pawn

can’t feel a silence of the mind

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Concluding a tissue of lies,

his life resides in a box;

confined, entrapped,

determined, defined

by discourse,

perverse.

No Peace.

http://dugganinquest.independent.gov.uk/docs/Jurys_Determination_and_Conclusion.pdf

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