Category: poetry

Destination : Land of Nod, by Jill Vance


By Robert Garnham 
Destination: Land of Nod

High-pitched hum of mosquito,
chant of ten green beer bottles,
bizarrely clucking chickens,
yet no sign of winged Hypnos
with his magic dust to sink me into sleep.

Lagoons, balloons, candles on cake,
endless counting of fence-dodging sheep,
tipping towards anger as I’m more awake.

Breezes, sunsets, turtles in the surf, 
the whoosh-whoosh of waves, 
feet downing into the plashy sand, 
torso heavier, scent of lavender, 
but no blasted sleep.



Jill Vance is a poet and interdisciplinary artist. Her poems have appeared in Truth Serum Press, Pure Slush, Dirigible Balloon and Green Ink Poetry. She hopes one day to have a pamphlet published of poetry and artwork.
 

Treadmill, by Karen Jones


By Robert Garnham 
Treadmill

The eve of Christmas Eve
Tills in overdrive, the carol
Of sale items no one wants
To give or receive
 
Cars snake into the underground
Of an out-of-town supermarket
Bulge in restrictive spaces
Swollen with purchases
 
Nearby at the chemist
Scripts arrive faster than FedEx
Inside a white-coated woman
Bags pills against the threat
Of rising inflammation, anything
To ease the innards of millions
Inhaling mince pies and Baileys
 
All to discard again
Dump from car to cistern
Via the slow mulch of bellies
Pressed against festooned tables
 
And now it is you bulging at the wheel
Rounding the corner on new year
Smelling of gift-boxed eau du parfum
That isn’t as nice as you had thought
 
But wager if nothing else
Masks the sulphur of January diets
En route to the gym again 
Of retail conveyor belts

Karen Jones began writing poetry in 2019, and was privileged to be a student of the late Kevin Higgins. Born in Northern Ireland, she lives in Dublin and works in public relations.

 

Carluccio’s, Ealing, Before Christmas, by John Lanyon


By Robert Garnham 
CARLUCCIO’S, EALING, BEFORE CHRISTMAS

Antonio,
big smiling man with the puffball hair
it’s almost like we’re on first name terms
you rich old mushroom hunter
how I might adoro your pomodoro
you master of corporate rusticity.

Your customers worked all week for this
if they want to sit down
they’re going to have to stand up
eat in
eat out
it’s all been worked out
black shirts
white shirts
it’s so cold tonight
your red and gold wrappings and trappings
your vibrantly green beans
your snowy mozzarella
your tanned, smiling staff melt my cynicism
100g at a time.

You dug up a good one.

Sooner or later
we’ll bore of your flavours
all the window dressing 
your one-stop Italy-to-go
but somewhere
as long as there are forests
there will be mushrooms.

John Lanyon lives in the Cotswolds. He works as an organic gardener, linguist, musician, and writer. Having failed his English Literature O Level, he came to love literature through reading it in French and German. He writes about art, the body, childhood, society, nature, the spirit of places, the secret lives of words.

 

The Archivist of Cathedral Hill, by Casey Jarrin


By Robert Garnham

Casey Jarrin is a poet, painter, and educator whose writing appears in Irish, UK, and US journals (Banshee, Abridged, Washington Square Review, Belfield Literary Review, Banyan Review, Buzzwords, Grand Journal). She’s received the York, Goldsmith, and Fingal Poetry Prizes, been on the Bridport shortlist, and performed as a featured poet at Lime Square and the Nuyorican Poets Café. A Jewish-Catholic atheist raised in New York who’s since lived in Dublin and Minneapolis, she received her PhD in modern literature/film, taught at Macalester College for several years, and is founder-director of Live Mind Learning. She’s now completing her debut collection, The Naked Dinner. Website: www.caseyjarrin.com

 

Get Over it, by Tonnie Richmond


By Robert Garnham 
Tonnie Richmond is a retired local government officer who has spent the last couple of decades as a volunteer archaeologist, working on digs in Cheshire and on Orkney. Many of her poems reflect her archaeological experiences and love of Orkney. She has had poems  published by Yaffle, Dragon/Yaffle, Driech, Leeds Trinity University and others. She is currently working on her first collection.
 

Sort, by Sarah J. Bryson


By Robert Garnham 
Sort 

What sort are you? 
Tea or coffee? 
Victoria Sponge, 
or a rich fruit cake? 
Dark chocolate Bounty, 
or a Milky Bar kid? 
Would you choose 
a bag of lemon drops, 
or a sherbet dip? 
Would you prefer 
a large gobstopper, 
or an Extra Strong Mint? 
Milk Tray or Green & Blacks?
Are you a suck it and see type, 
or a gobble and go individual? 
Do you think birds of a feather
flock together, or rather that
opposites attract? 
Maybe you are
a Foxes Glacier Mint?
Me? I’m a Licorice Allsort

Sarah is interested in words, words for well being, people and nature and the connections between these elements. She has poems in print journals, anthologies and on line.

 

Starless, by Patrick Chapman


By Robert Garnham 
Starless
 
Set to amuse an empress of India, diamonds are
not even fruit – but flush with satsumas
 
alone, try getting someone to love you for
money. Made in the whirl of a stellar
 
ballet, tangelos yield to the cut of my Japanese
blade. The crush of my hand makes me wonder
 
how diamond and orange are brought to our shores –
and what old blood we spill into new Mason jars.

PATRICK CHAPMAN has published nine poetry collections since 1991. Other books include a novel, three volumes of stories, and a guide to the work of David Cronenberg. His next poetry collection, The Following Year, appears from Salmon in 2023. He lives in Dublin.