from Fragments...

Such Fun

It was such fun to jump in autumn puddles,

that made mud spatters on my red wellies 

and pale, sun starved legs,

in weather too wet to kick up the leaves

that lay swept soggily into piles.

And when winter came, such fun 

to leap into snow drifts 

that came over the tops of my red wellies

and my extra socks

as I tested the deepness of the snow 

and the slipperiness of the ice slide.

Come the summer rain, I tried on my red wellies

but they had grown too small or me too large,

so I got my feet wet when I jumped in the stream.

Such fun, but I missed my red wellies.

First published in Midnight Circus, Fall issue, EAB publishing

https://www.amazon.com/Midnight-Circus-Fall-EAB-Publishing/dp/1537355457/ref=sr_1_11?ie=UTF8&qid=1474753123&sr=8-11&keywords=midnight+circus+eab+publishing

My Father’s Son

I never knew

my father’s son.

Even though

I met him once,

or maybe twice, 

I never knew him.

And then I met

his son. 

Caught him 

miraculously

in a net.

Held on to him 

tightly.

And, I found

that he hadn’t left early,

my father’s son.

He’d waited for me,

wondering,

for a long time.

And so I found him,

my father’s son.

When he was 

just ninety six,

I found him.

But I was too late

to know him.

At ninety five,

he was already dead.

So I never knew him,

my father’s son.

https://www.createspace.com/6575459

First published in Scarlet Leaf Review, May 2016

The Hoopoes Are Back

The hoopoes are back, 

even though

the walls and holes they liked to nest in

were destroyed by human nest builders 

four years ago,

when there was a housing boom

and money to be made.

The hoopoes are back, 

even though 

the new holes and rubble they liked to nest in

were destroyed by human nest builders

three years ago, 

even though, 

there was no market for nests

and no money to be made.

The hoopoes are back, 

even though

the new holes and rubble they liked to nest in

were washed away two years ago,

as the walls that stopped the storm flow 

were destroyed by human nest builders,

to prepare the ground for money to be made.

The hoopoes are back, 

even though 

their nesting places are hidden, buried 

under growing mountains of rubble brought 

by the human nest builders a year ago

as there is no demand for human nests

and no money to be made, except from rubble.

Hey, the hoopoes are back! I’ve seen them!

The hoopoes are back!

 https://intothebardo.wordpress.com/portfolio/the-hoopoes-are-back/

First published by Furry Writers Guild in Civilised Beasts Anthology, 2015, Weasel Press

It’s Clear

On a clear night

I should see the moon full silver

in a sky shot by moonbeams.

Not greyed by a smoky mist 

and dust clouds rising from the ruins.

I should see a black, black sky.

Not bright from the orange glow

from the fires of hell on earth.

Which send sparks high enough

to compete with the stars,

the pinpoint moonbeam spangles.

Not beamed by lasers.

I should hear the silence 

in the depth of the black night,

not the explosive cacophony

bought by the masters of war

and the silent screams

buried in the rubble.

I should hear people talking in the street

and the music and laughter of the night.

I should see them walking home

to feel firm flesh loving and soft

unsplintered and unblemished by shrapnel,

unbroken by the metal clad monsters

masquerading as humanity and

wrapping themselves in the uniforms 

of thousand years old myths

dressed up as history.

These should be my rights.

But they aren’t.

I have no rights.

Nor do you.

Only what they give us,

the men of the flags,

temporally.

First published by Harbinger Asylum, Literary Review, Spring, 2015

http://www.socialjusticepoetry.com/5271/its-clear-a-social-justice-poem-by-lynn-white

Like Alice

I’m too big.

I’m too small.

I can’t I fit in,

fit into this, rabbit hole world,

any more than I did the other,

the above ground world.

Both can’t be wrong,

can they?

It must be me

that doesn’t fit,

that can’t be made

to fit into them.

Me that’s wrong.

Both worlds can’t be wrong,

can they?

First published in Poetry Breakfast, September 2016

https://poetrybreakfast.com/2016/09/19/like-alice-a-poem-by-lynn-white/

Dreamers

The sun is standing still for them
Standing still for the streams of dreamers.
Dreamers streaming down the roads to somewhere
else.
From somewhere that has become nowhere.
Dreaming of escape.
Dreaming of a future, any future.
Dreaming of better things to come.
Dreaming of the life they once had.
Dreaming of normality, whatever that means.
Dreaming, dreaming, dreaming.
Dreaming of returning
when the sun comes up again,
if ever it does.

First published in Expound, Issue 6, 2016

https://bywriters.com/poetry/dreamers-583/

Dawn Chorus

It starts with one.

One skylark singing.

One Carson warning.

Then the robins and blackbirds join in. 

The early birds, like Carson.

Then the wrens and warblers

as the daylight warms them.

Listen.

Can you hear them?

The warning calls are warming up as well,

strengthening their numbers 

as the bird song

dies away.

Listen.

Listen.

Can you hear them?

Listen. 

Don’t sleep.

Don’t wait

to hear 

the silence.

First published by Ealain, Extinctions Issue 7, April, 2015

https://intothebardo.wordpress.com/portfolio/dawn-chorus/

In The End

In the end 

I’ll be like you.

Dust with

flakes of skin and bone

wrapped in long hair.

Teeth chattering

With no voice.

No sense of taste

or smell.

No reason.

In the end

we'll be invisible,

impenetrable,

anonymous,

figments.

But then, we always were

you and I,

we always were.

First Published in In Flight Magazine, Paper Plane Pilots, January 2015

http://www.magcloud.com/browse/issue/1155666?__r=116913

Washed Up

So many dead people 

caught in the crossfire

created by the the money men, 

the arms traders,

the super ego-ed politicians.

They lie dead where they fell.

Flesh and blood transformed to 

fertilizer to nurture the seeds 

and grow the crops, in a future

they will not see.

Their bones decaying to dust

to form the building blocks 

of homes they will never inhabit.

Dying where they fell, 

over there, not here

and not looking like us.

Unseen or soon forgotten

by us here. 

But the dead washed up

on holiday beaches

look like our flesh and blood.

They’re wearing our clothes.

They’re washing up to haunt us

in the Old World.

Then there’s the living,

washed up alive 

and by any means necessary

moving on to bear witness, 

if any one is listening.

To bring the horror home 

to those who created it

in the Old World.

Bringing it home to the Old World,

but not as yet to the New.

First published in Whirlwind, 2015

https://iamnotasilentpoet.wordpress.com/2016/09/12/washed-up-by-lynn-white/

Pool

I have a small pool

out there.

Not dark like night, but

full of pale milky light.,

and shimmering smoothly,

rippleless.

It's not deep either,

hardly more than

a footfall.

Just deep enough

to hide my dreams

without them drowning.

https://poetrybreakfast.com/2016/09/10/pool-a-poem-by-lynn-white/

A Rose For Gaza

Gaza is a garden full of roses.

Stone roses.

Rock roses.

No petals to crush and bruise

to release their fragrance.

Only dust.

Dust and the stench

of death.

No green space left.

No sweet tranquility,

peace or quiet.

No escape.

No garden of Eden here.

No gateway to paradise.

Rubble and rock roses.

So I shall plant a rose for Gaza

in my green space,

in my tranquil garden.

I won’t bruise it,

just gently sniff its fragrance

and hope that one day

fragrant roses will bloom again

in the garden of Gaza.

What else can I do?

http://www.snapdragonjournal.com/store/p14/%22Forgiveness%22_Fall_2016_issue.html

Moving On

They said that you never go back

once you leave home.

I was sure I would

and I promised

my mother

as we packed the big black trunk.

I was homesick and in tears those

first few days in college.

‘Hay fever’, I said.

In September!

I promised

I’d come home at the weekend

And I did, I did as just I’d promised.

But I didn’t want to go.

Didn’t want to leave

all my new friends

and all the new

possibilities,

though it was nice to meet old ones again.

I had lots to tell them about my new home,

my new friends and my new place.

And about all the excitement.

I planned for old friends

to visit my new home

and they did

eventually.

And then the new went to visit the old.

But ‘they’ were right to say that

you never go back home

once you leave.

I never did.

Not really.

I never

went back

to stay.

First published in Silver Birch Press, September 2016

https://silverbirchpress.wordpress.com/2016/09/08/moving-on-poem-by-lynn-white-when-i-moved-poetry-and-prose-series/

Anxious

I am dancing

in the sunlight,

the bright, bright light.

I know the cloud is there

but I can forget it, till I stop.

And then..

There it is,

even bigger 

and blacker

than before.

Darker than 

ever.

It doesn’t like me dancing,

doesn’t like the laughter

or the sunshine.

Brightness breaks it,

shatters it into a grey mist.

But still it won’t leave me.

The brighter the sunlight,

the louder the laughter,

the greater my fear

that it will form again

and suck me into it’s

darkness.


http://whispersinthewind333.blogspot.co.uk/

 Green Dragon

Does the horse believe what he's seeing

as the green dragon floats by

breathing rainbows

from flower filled puffs of breath.

Would you believe it?

Would I

believe it?

After all,

this is not the usual sort of dragon

whose fire filled breaths register alarm.

But alarm registers, never the less,

as this is not the usual sort of dragon

and none of us are sure

what will happen next.

http://visualverse.org/submissions/green-draon/

https://zoetic-press.myshopify.com/products/nonbinary-review-10-alice-in-wonderland