Monday, 31 October 2016

Once

Once I was whole.
Complete.
Unbroken.
Once I breathed
air.
Once I walked.
I spoke,
I smiled, 
I looked sad.
Yes, 
once I had feelings.
And then,
my sadness was selected.
Chosen
and frozen in it’s beauty.
And then,
the rest of me decayed,
vanished,
returned to dust.
And now
even the effigy is broken,
the marble decaying.
Only sadness remains.
And soon, 
even that
will join me
in the dust.

http://voxpoetica.com/prompts/

Sunday, 30 October 2016

Oranges


Little paper people
eating oranges.
Big paper people
eating oranges.

Brown paper bags
full of people

eating oranges. 

First published in Zombie Logic Review, October 2016

http://zombielogicreview.blogspot.co.uk/2016/10/welsh-poet-lynn-white.html

Thursday, 27 October 2016

       Dreams


One day soon they'll try to dig up your dreams.
You'll be dead by then,
unable to protect them
any more.

They'll let you rest in peace, but not your dreams.
They'll want them for sure,
they'll want them.
They'll want them to try and find you,
to try and discover who you were.

They'll dig them up, scrabbling amongst the dirt,
seeing what they can find.
Digging up the dirt
to see what they can find 
in there.

They'll discard this piece here, another piece there.
Dross from the dried up remnants,
They'll hang on to the moist bits.
The juicy bits are worth further analysis.

You may be in there.
In your dreams.

Someone else will scrabble to catch 
the dry pieces,
those fragments of dreams thrown away.
The little pieces blown away in the air.
Little snippets,
dreamlets.

But there are flakes of gold hidden there.
I hope they don't find them.

http://stanzaicstylings.blogspot.co.uk/2016/10/dreams-by-lynn-white.html


First published in Anti-Heroin Chic, February 2016

Wednesday, 26 October 2016

God Save the Sheep

God save the sheep
baa aah.
Where would we be without them.
Who would lead if no one followed?
Why bother to whip up their storm of frenzy,
to feed them on blades of rumours 
ready to become knowledge, to become fact.
Baa aah. 
Say it again,
baa aah.
And only white sheep allowed,
of course.
No black or pink or purple 
to shatter the consensus.
Colours cannot be tolerated,
along with druggies and drunks
and survivors of abuse.
Oh dear me, no,
not appropriate here.
Baa aah
And suppose they stay? 
Baa aa aah
Plant their hooves in our cheap wet fields,
sneak inside our friendly flock
and contentedly munch
a thistle here, 
a spikey rush there.
Baa aah.
Drown them out
baa aah,
baa aah.
God save the sheep.


https://iamnotasilentpoet.wordpress.com/2016/10/26/god-save-the-sheep-by-lynn-white/

Tuesday, 25 October 2016

Predictable

I feel such a bright energy flowing,
zipping through my veins.
I can’t wait to move with it,
to uproot myself,
to be transplanted and reborn,
to recreate myself 
at the time when all of nature
is recreating itself and starting afresh.
I will be reborn too in another place.
I’ve done it before and felt the new buds open,
bursting and shooting into a new life.
I've felt the excitement of the new spaces,
embraced the interest in the new peoples’ faces.
And then..

I’ve opened up my blowsy petals and
let my heart show through
pulsing,
exuberant,
ready
to turn towards the summer sun,
not believing it will destroy
my bloom,
make my petals fade and fall
when the shock of the new wears off
and the fresh green shoots start to brown,
and prepare for the season of wrinkles,
which always follows,
as my life folds out as before.

Soon I’ll be getting ready 
for the ice of winter
in this new place.
A new place, but
with the same person in it.
To change where I am is the easy part.
To change who I am is difficult, hardly possible.
But without this change, 
nothing will change,
except that summer will have gone,
winter will surely follow fall
and spring will be a long way away.




First published in Pilcrow and Dagger, May 2016

Monday, 24 October 2016

In Dreams


Do you dream in colour,
or are your dreams grey,
muted monochromes,
pale imitations of reality.
Are they flat almost featureless
in a blurred mist,
or are they stark
black and white.
No grey.
No doubt.
Are your sleeping eyes prisms
to reflect the outside in,
in a spectrum of rainbowed glory.
Or are you afraid.
Afraid to let it enter
your unconsciousness.
Afraid to set it free
to make a kaleidoscope
of shades and tones
to recreate
a new reality
in glorious colour.
Do you remember?

Saturday, 22 October 2016


Shrouded

They’re following me,
stalking my dreams
and waking times,
shrouded in mist almost
as dark as the shrouds
they wear to cover themselves,
to cloak themselves
for their journey.
Shrouds like dusty abayas
uniformly grey,
shapeless,
bloodless,
formless,
lifeless
grey.
Only their mouths still red,
stained by their final feast.
The feast of what was left.
And now there’s nothing,
nothing any more.
No more.
Nothing.

http://www.magcloud.com/browse/issue/1180336

Friday, 21 October 2016

Bobbley Things

Those knobbley, bobbley things 
are marching forth
covering the sidewalks 
in a pavement proliferation
of ever wider strips,
ever steeper ramps,
ever stranger cambers
determined to catch you out.
I know that they are only really designed 
to trip up those who can’t see very well,
but they are a problem for everyone
those knobbley, bobbley things.

I wonder, was the man designing them 
bitten by a vicious guide dog, out of control?
Or perhaps he was floored by the too eager 
waving of a white stick?
I think something has caused him 
to bear a grudge.
But it can’t be justified.
when they are difficult for everyone
those knobbley bobbley things.

And yes, I know it’s a ‘him’.
No woman would endanger 
her high heeled strut
in such a way.
They are a male invention,
those knobbley, bobbley things.
Man made and increasingly
creating problems for everyone.
Seemingly unstoppable
in their forward march.


First published in Zombie Logic Review, October 2016

Monday, 17 October 2016

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?


https://intothebardo.wordpress.com/portfolio/a-rose-for-gaza/


First published by Poets Haven, Vending Machine in Poetry for Change Anthology 2014





Sunday, 16 October 2016

Aftermath

How can it be that someone
I don't see, 
only think 
about sometimes,
but never contact,
or try to,
leaves such a gap,
in their final leaving.

My life has not been changed.
All is the same.
So why the difference now
that you're really in the past,
when you were already part of my past
and not of my future.

Nothing has changed for me,
not really,
not in reality.
So why do you occupy my thoughts
in a different way.
Why does my future feel different
now you cannot be part of it,
even though you never would be
and I knew it.

Perhaps because I can no longer
dream you there.
But why not
when you could never be there
and I knew it
the same then, 
as I know now.
Why is it different,
now
even to dream?

http://stanzaicstylings.blogspot.co.uk/2016/10/afrermath-by-lynn-white.html


First published in With Painted Words, July 2015

Saturday, 15 October 2016

Separate Development

We must develop separately, you and I,
you on your side, me on mine.
The wall between us
unscalable,
impenetrable,
unfathomable.

They built it so.

We must undermine it, you and I,
you on your side, me on mine,
Burrow beneath  
the rocky foundation,
scratch away,
one stone at a time.

Wall fall down.


https://intothebardo.wordpress.com/portfolio/separate-development/

Friday, 14 October 2016

Doll

My little princess.
My china doll with your
peachy skin and
golden hair. 
In pink frills
I dressed you up,
combed you and curled you.
Made you into
my special pet,
my little angel,
to be loved and cherished.
My creation.
My little girl.

But all the time
you were making up yourself,
getting ready to 
smash the porcelain,
and break out
to become 
the creation you had
already made up
even before you painted 
and inked your pearly skin,
combed your hair straight,
and gelled it 
into jagged spikes
with a pink splash.
Shockingly, piercing the past,
you broke out into your future.

For you were never a princess,
never a doll,
and most of all, little girl,
you were never mine,
never mine to mould.

https://writinginawomansvoice.blogspot.co.uk/2016/10/doll-by-lynn-white-my-little-princess.html

Wednesday, 12 October 2016

The Village of Twee
I am just arrived in the village of Twee
with its little front gardens carefully wild,
with its thatch nicely polished, 
its flowers dust free.
I wonder who tends them
in the village of Twee.
Who shampoos the pinks
who waters the pots,
who sweeps up the leaves
and prunes all the phlox.
There’s no humans to see
in the village of Twee,
just cars with their robots,
red, white and pink.
They wave as they drive through
with shopping piled high
singing ‘tra lah lah, welcome and fiddle di di.
There’s a welcome for all in the village of Twee.’
They park right outside,
with the pavements long gone
to give wider roads for motoring robots.
So how did it happen, this robotic coup.
There must be a story or legend to tell
to explain the strange culture I came across there.
Well, pavements weren't needed
with no humans to walk
and that’s how it started
if truth it be told.
And it’s ‘tra lah lah, welcome and fiddle di di’
as the robots drive smiling through the village of Twee.
So are there still humans?
I've heard they're indoors
their legs long since wasted,
they're unable to walk.
So the robots took over
and they do what they can
to keep the thatch polished
and dig up the weeds,
to feed all that need it
and take out the waste.
And when work is finished their day will come,
when new robots grow older, they can move on.
Singing ‘tra lah lah, bye now and fiddle di di,
there’ll be no more humans in the village of Twee’
First published in Pillcrow and Dagger, October 2016

http://pilcrowdagger.com/subscriptions/

Tuesday, 11 October 2016

Predictable

I feel such a bright energy flowing,
zipping through my veins.
I can’t wait to move with it,
to uproot myself,
to be transplanted and reborn,
to recreate myself 
at the time when all of nature
is recreating itself and starting afresh.
I will be reborn too in another place.
I’ve done it before and felt the new buds open,
bursting and shooting into a new life.
I've felt the excitement of the new spaces,
embraced the interest in the new peoples’ faces.
And then..

I’ve opened up my blowsy petals and
let my heart show through
pulsing,
exuberant,
ready
to turn towards the summer sun,
not believing it will destroy
my bloom,
make my petals fade and fall
when the shock of the new wears off
and the fresh green shoots start to brown,
and prepare for the season of wrinkles,
which always follows,
as my life folds out as before.

Soon I’ll be getting ready 
for the ice of winter
in this new place.
A new place, but
with the same person in it.
To change where I am is the easy part.
To change who I am is difficult, hardly possible.
But without this change, 
nothing will change,
except that summer will have gone,
winter will surely follow fall

and spring will be a long way away.

http://heroinchic.weebly.com/blog/two-poems-by-lynn-white6713263

First published by Pilcrow and Dagger, May 2016

Saturday, 8 October 2016

Mirror, Mirror

Mirror, mirror, tell me
who do you see.
Is she white,
snow white,
whiter than white,
fairer than fair.
White as virgin snow
unbroken by footprints,
unblemished,
unsullied.
Or is her snowy white
greying
as time passes,
picking up some of the dirt
in passing.
Maybe darker still in places
as its whiteness decays 
and melts
away.
Tell me, mirror,
who do you see?

https://writinginawomansvoice.blogspot.co.uk/


First published in Silver Birch Press ‘Same Name’ series, Feb 2016
If I Were A Butterfly

If I were a butterfly
where would I fly?
I could grace every home
bringing good luck every time.
Make sure that my children
ate up all the weeds,
and recycled the waste
without judgement or hate.
In a world that’s at peace
I’d find my place.
Hmm, if I were a butterfly
I’d think this must wait.

If I were a butterfly
where would I fly?
If my soul were parochial
it would hang in my space,
It would look pretty in my garden,
propagate where I said,
and keep watch with indulgence
as my kids ate the rest.
If I were a butterfly
I’d think this was sad.
A life is too short
to live in the past.

If I were a butterfly
where would I fly?
Like all souls of dead warriors
for justice and peace, 
I’d fly
down the throats of the haters,
war mongers, arms traders, 
parasitic self servers.
Yes.
They’d choke on my body
and ingest my eggs.
My children would eat them,
feast on them, thrive
then fly on to the next.
Yes.
If I were a butterfly
that’s where I’d fly.

If I were a butterfly
then where would I fly?
I would grace every home
bringing good luck every time.
I would make sure that my children
ate up all the weeds,
and recycled the waste
without judgement or hate.
In a world that’s at peace
I’d find my place.

https://silverbirchpress.wordpress.com/2016/10/08/if-i-were-a-butterfly-poem-by-lynn-white-if-i-poetry-prose-series/

First published in Anti Heroin Chic, August 2016




Friday, 7 October 2016

At Night

I think I am less afraid
of the dark than the light.
Night time engulfs me,
covers me gently
with it’s thick darkness,
comforts me with it’s curtains 
of blackness.
I don’t need to hide.
It hides me. 
Hides me from exposure,
hides from me that which I fear 
to see exposed.
When the light falls
I can see the ruins
surrounding me
and I am afraid
of what lies within.
Afraid of what will be exposed
by the light,
afraid of what I will expose
in the light.

First published in Poetry Breakfast, October 2016

https://poetrybreakfast.com/

Thursday, 6 October 2016

Light And Dark

The light always seek to hide
the dark.
The dark,
the infiltrator of the light,
the secret side emerging
uneasily,
ready to cast a shadow
that will add to your mystery.
And,
just maybe
shine a light
inside
your depths.
The dark
revealing what the light
was hiding. 
Not everything,
not all,
but some things
that were hidden
by the light.
Enough.


First published in Visual Verse, October 2016

http://visualverse.org/submissions/light-and-dark/

Wednesday, 5 October 2016

The Skin I'm In

I used to wonder
how I would grow
and yet still fit in the skin I'm in.
If we would grow together,
me and my skin.
Well, we seemed to have done
quite well
for a long time.

I used to wonder
how you would grow,
and if you would still fit 
the skin you are in.
And if we would grow together
and stay intact in our
separate skins.
Well, we seemed to have done,
for a long time 
anyway.

Now I wonder…

Am I still the same person
under the skin? 
Are you?
I think I am.
The outside has changed.
But inside my skin
I am intact. 
Myself as before.
I think.

Not quite so comfortable 
in my new skin, though.
It doesn't fit me too well.
Doesn't always represent me.
Doesn't look like I still feel.
Like I still am?

What about you?
Are you still that person 
in your new skin?
I'm not sure now if the inside 
has also been renewed,
changed.

And if it is only on the outside, 
that we have changed together.


First published in Anti Heroin Chic, Oct 4 2016

http://heroinchic.weebly.com/blog/two-poems-by-lynn-white6713263

Tuesday, 4 October 2016

The End

Once up on a time 
he thought
the worst would be
not knowing
what happened next,
not knowing 
how it all ended.
Now,
with the madness spiralling 
into an ever tighter vortex,
he no longer wants to know
more.
Now 
he thinks 
there will be no end 
to the madness.
Only his end

with his death.

Monday, 3 October 2016

A Disappointing Day

If they hadn’t asked her
to smell the nice scent.
If she hadn’t remembered
the scent from before.
There would have been 
no screams, no stamping 
up and down on the trolley.

The nurse would still 
have her cap on
and the doctor would have
no fist or feet marks
on his white coat,
no red hand mark
on his pale cheek.

There would have been
no shock, horror reports
to those who had put away
Red Riding Hood
and were waiting
anxiously for news
of their little girl.

But they did ask her.
They did ask her.

The scent wasn’t nice.
She knew it.
And there was no ice cream
afterwards either.
They’d lied about that
as well.

A disappointing day.


http://www.versewrights.com/


First published by Calliope, February, 2015

Saturday, 1 October 2016

The Fall

I'm running downhill
running 
faster and faster.
I'm crossing the bridge now,
still running,
running
to the end of the bridge,
trying to see the end.
But there is no end
and I'm falling now,
falling,
falling.
falling into the arms
of the demons below
with their waving arms
outstretched
and their claws primed
waiting to break my fall
and swallow me up
into their depths.
I grasp at the air,
cling to the wind
flailing,
falling.
flailing.
Then,
I’m clinging 
to a hopeful ray of sunshine
to carry me up,
to take me with it
into the light.
Now
I'm floating,
floating,
floating upwards or down.
It's not clear,
am I still falling or am I
floating upwards
into the light.


First published in Spillwords, October 1 2016 with artwork by Lynn White

http://spillwords.com/the-fall/