Chase
Lawrence Gartshore
Chase:
A buxom chest, and charm to boot,
she really does offer much but
her friend, a beauty I’ve never known.
Is that a door I wish to shut?
I truly shouldn’t hope for both –
no, I must set my sights with care
for no matter how much she smiles
my eyes are always eyes are always fixed on…her.
The unobtainable its true
has always fixated me more
than stood beside that pretty girl,
than a gamble free shag that is sure.
They Left When They Did Because They Could.
Isobel Salt
the Wind was lifted and drawn swiftly out.
Space roared,
‘what on Earth is going on here?’
(which, in its defence, was a good question.)
but Wind was gone, and the void was vast.
reeds crushed by air – nothing nurtures in still
and with Moon gone Water lost its wave.
BLOOD was forgotten – no need to kill,
come see mankind sent back to the cave.
Time quick tailed Wind, leaving man to suffer,
now void drinks silences’ lucent flood.
man dredges on, abiding stale hunger
by drowning pity’s glut in mud.
Space, back then, was the last to speak,
Time didn’t bother to leave anything
behind.
Bathtime
Carrie Sear
For my kindred spirit
white bathtub, underpants, matching bras
coloured concoctions in clear glass jars
and the Mother laughs
past the door with no lock.
what a way to cleanse a cluttered life
charcoal fingerpainting is underrated,
skin for canvas hotly debated, yet
we make carving initials into trees
anti-kitsch, un-cringe.
when the long-cold water drains away
it takes hostage secrets and crud and hair dye
leaves us our bellies and spots, towels nearby.
all the watermelon gummies in the world
could not provide a mellow joy like this.
Loosen Up
Elizabeth Marney
It is a blistering Summer
as he strides into my house.
Doesn’t think twice
about my words, just my mouth.
Says there’s so many feelings
behind this feeling. Says that
He has more feelings than
I could possibly imagine.
He needs me,
he says.
The way you could barrel
through seven ice lollies
on a sweltering hot day.
The way that when desperation strikes
you don’t wait for sugar water to melt in your mouth.
Ravenous, he tells me,
you suck.
My Mother’s Coat
Beth Blackwell
Between the living room and the kitchen
There is a door.
Signatures of my siblings form a road map,
Stretching from top to bottom
Sporadic lines like signposts
Marking the miles of growth.
Hung off the back is my mother’s blue coat.
Dark navy,
With ripped sleeves to wipe my tears
And deep pockets to hold my problems.
It hangs, oversized, just past my knees.
The wool inside gathers in
Irregular
Places.
This home of mine is spacious
And a curious little girl shares it with me.
I remember her,
From a lifetime ago
And her name is scribbled on the door.
She is like me,
Only her hair is blonde
And her nails aren’t bitten.
In many ways she is not me,
Except for the home we share,
Wrapped away in my mother’s blue coat.
Lyric
Cosmo Adair
Love rots away in the footnotes
Of the heart’s biography —
A musty, damp-eaten, hardback book
In an obsolete library —
Time sits by, with an abject hand
Fingering a quarter-to-three —
The ceiling doesn’t brighten now
And my eyes can’t shut or see —
The Moon is at its climax now —
And sad Pierrot thinks he sees
Lips in the starscape — the arresting
Water ripples in the breeze —
The water (that Great Rememberer
Of things it’s heard so much before),
Knows there’s one kind, abstract solace
And tempts him to the shore —
The water ripples; paint dissolves
From his quaint and guileless face —
Oh, what can moon-bitten lovers do
But tear at life’s anfractuous lace.
To Dream
Cosmo Adair
To dream — the cold awakens, darkness berths
A strange delight. We beat on. Wings outstretched
Make battle with land. One thing I’ve learned:
The struggle, the pulp — all dissolve, divide,
When the Sun first scribbles the land in Prose.
The Sailing-Boat
Jake Henson
At once there was a Sailing-Boat,
A chariot of swift oak frame,
Then skimming upon the river’s throat
They heard the voice proclaim:
Pull on the silvery halyard!
Grasp th’ethereal cords,
Hear the mechanically whispering bard,
With tales of harlequin fjords.
Walk from our vessel of drudgery
A plank of fracturing joy,
To swim in an idyllic rosary
And thousands of fishes employ
For infinite trading and trafficking
along rows of celestial scales,
whilst idols and wheels are mimicking
a lattice of unholy grails.
Starlight creeps over the mountains,
To set the attention ablaze,
And five hundred luminous fountains,
Attract the pulsating gaze
And what of the boat which is sailing?
The swift-footed ode to the sky,
It carries its crew who are ailing
From an always-devouring eye.
Circle Two
Alex Kramskaya
Send yourself rip-roaring through me
why don’t you?
Rip-Roaring! Tearing through my
delicate, delicate, skin.
Snarling, growling, mouth agape –
A bull in a china shop never made a sound
As the final glass tipped.
Sending me sprawling
Clawing at straws on fire
Dante himself could not hope to imagine
Such horrors as these.
Card House
The ward was grey. In fact it was the most obscenely grey place I’d ever been in. The walls, the chairs, the tables, the signs, the clothes, really the only deviation was the dull flesh of the patient who was staring at me as I entered – looking through me as though I were glass. Like my regrets were written out across my skull. Her mouth was pulled back in a grin that tried to be welcoming, but lay just wide enough to make me afraid, and then embarrassed. I dropped my gaze like a shy dog, and walked up to the counter. The man behind thick panelled glass asked who I was here to see and I realised I’d
almost forgotten her legal name. I spoke it for the first time in years.
“Ines Nguyen”
“She’s waiting for you in the visitors area, first door to your left.”
And dear god she was a fucking beacon. Wearing my roommates orange shirt, her green hair fell flat against the sides of her head, she sat at a table with three others, all scribbling on paper with thick, blunt crayons. I walked over and put a hand on her shoulder, peering over at her drawing of an old man with huge tits. As soon as I did she turned to me, her features shifting from confusion to excitement before leaping up and crushing me in her arms.
“I’m sorry I didn’t call, I typed your number wrong” She sighed.
“They took your phone?” I questioned, pulling her off.
She looked different. Cleaner. I’d seen her first thing in the morning, straight out of the shower and she’d never looked so clean. She drew me up a chair, rubbery and large and heavy as she leaned the full weight of her frail body to slide it across the floor. She didn’t speak about the night she was put in there; when she called me crying, begging me to come over, I couldn’t hear
the fear in her voice and I said no. Of my misplaced hope that a bad night was just a bad night. Of the hole she put through her wall or the scars on her arms that were now thickly bandaged over. Peeking out from beneath orange sleeves.
No, she wanted to ask me about my week, while I’d lie about classes I couldn’t force myself to go to, and friends I kept in the dark, and pretend I wasn’t looking guilt in the fucking face.
I suggested building a card house when the others had finished drawing. The group obliged me, and – I’ve come to think – enjoyed my company that night, as I did theirs. There was a boy who looked quite young, our age and had the kind of face I’d imagine on a mormon missionary, another was a stocky middle aged woman – Vivian I think – who spoke mostly of her children which was endearing until she claimed to be a virgin. She built a damn strong house of cards.
The last person on the table was a slim older fellow, Tony. He was bald, with a smooth shaven face and the kind of eyes that make you second guess yourself. The words he spoke were enigmatic, charming, shamefully I couldn’t help but wonder how he ended up in the ward.
For the hour we played no one managed to build more than two stories before the deck would fold in on itself and the teasing and laughing and anecdotes would commence again. The few times afterwards I came to visit, Vivian and the
boy sat alone, never with a visitor. Save for that first time though, Tony always sat across from a
petite woman with a beautiful smile, who Ines later told was his Fiance. That first visit though, while she’d gone to fetch a book from her room, he lay his hand on mine and said to me,
“You’re a good friend coming in a shithole like this and showing her a good time, showing all of us a good time, not many people in here have friends like that”
For the hours I pitied myself, and for the guilt that hung on me overnight. For the tossing and turning and what ifs that ran through my head until I stepped foot in that place. It took those words for me to know I was an asshole. That all it took was idiotic validation to know that
kindness didn’t have to look like saving her, or reversing time.
When that day it just looked like strangers meeting and a poorly built house of
cards.
