https://www.flipsnack.com/CA5F6FCC5A8/redrosethorns-magazine-issue-one-communityconnection/full-view.html
Saturday, 30 July 2022
Friday, 29 July 2022
City Lights
I’d walked down the street many times
in both day time and night time
and not noticed them.
I’d driven down there many times
in both day time and night time
and not noticed them.
But something seen so often may become unseen
without a new perspective,
a new dimension.
And tonight I climbed higher
to see the street from above.
A mosaic lay below me,
a city of squares.
Squares,
where there
were no squares
before.
Squares of light
projected
like an art installation,
broken and fragmented
making the ordinary
into extraordinary.
https://www.ekphrastic.net/ekphrastic-writing-challenges/joy-baer-ekphrastic-writing-responses
Monday, 25 July 2022
Seeing All
I can see you.
I’m not blinded
by your fine words
or the fancy dress
of your masquerade.
But even the blind can see
through you.
In time there’ll be pennies for my eyes
but they’re open now and missing nothing.
I know you want to hide from me,
would have me cover my eyes
with my hands
or stitch them up
to make me sightless
as death.
But it won’t work.
I’ll look between the stitches
sneak a peek through my parted fingers.
And even the blinded can see
through you.
Sightlessness
comes only with death.
Until then
we all can see
you.
https://plumtreetavernhomeless.blogspot.com/2022/07/seeing-all.html
Friday, 22 July 2022
Void
There are clouded spaces
so dark I can’t see into them.
I have always been afraid
that monstrous beings
may lurk there,
waiting.
But now that the cloud
is lifting, moving away,
I am even more afraid,
afraid of the light
afraid
it may reveal
the bare boards.
https://www.rudderlessmarinerpoetry.com/blogpoetrysubmission/void-by-lynn-white?fbclid=IwAR0v8Z7rdiQ6nV8FIHW-PyORqXnEtU8rnSXZoSnx8Triiw-c8T5Tb5hRK88
In The Rocks
Monday, 18 July 2022
Broken
The crack became a slash
almost splitting her in two.
She could have sought help,
could have driven to heal it,
But after a while she quite liked it.
It had become part of her
and she felt it became her
and who knew what would emerge
to wriggle
and squeeze
though the gap.
https://ephemeralelegies.com/2022/07/18/broken-by-lynn-white/comment-page-1/#comment-6051
Friday, 15 July 2022
One Last Time
Before the trees begin to fall
I’ll take a walk
through the woods
one last time,
hear the leaves glistening
and shaking
in fear of what is to come
some are already fallen
lying
dying,
it’s the season for it
after all.
I’ll see the light shining
lighting on the leaves of grass
that push soft spikes of green life
in between the fallen
see the light shining
through the trees
one last time.
It lights up the white crosses
chalked on the trunks
as it passes by
too many white crosses
all ready
to mark the graves
of the fallen.
It’s the season for it
after all,
always the season for it
one more time.
https://www.transformativepowerofartjournal.com/
Performance Art
He’s the last man standing.
Whether comedian
or statesman
performance is all
for the last man standing.
Standing in the rubble of the city.
Standing on the bodies of the dead heroes,
those lions led by donkeys once again.
No more laughter,
no more tears,
the final curtain
came down on them.
Hollow victory
or glorious defeat
it’s all the same to them.
But the last man still stands,
the star of the show
temporarily.
https://www.transformativepowerofartjournal.com/
When Psychopath Met Showman
When a violent psycho with overwhelming power
meets a deluded showman with a hero complex
it’s looking bleak for those caught in between.
Those displaced from their homes,
displaced from their lives,
those losing their lives.
those losing the life
they expected to live,
More and more of them,
a stream without end
as the show goes on.
https://www.transformativepowerofartjournal.com/
Collateral Damage
Once they were cities,
noisy
alive
lived in
now
only blackened carcasses
remain,
still
standing
where all else has fallen.
Jagged towers,
the bare bones
of dreams
standing
still.
Still as the lost dreams
stopped in their tracks.
Standing
still
the graveyard of the lost,
the lost
dreams and dreamers.
https://www.transformativepowerofartjournal.com/
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://www.transformativepowerofartjournal.com/
Tuesday, 12 July 2022
The Sins Of The Fathers
We had parked in a quiet Skopje side street
and the Germans parked in front were
surveying the wreckage of their car.
“They don’t like Germans here,” they said.
We sympathised.
“It’s because of what the Germans did
in Yugoslavia in the war,” we replied.
“But that wasn’t us!” they said.
And of course they were right!
The sins of the fathers..
“But not our fathers”
they might have responded.
And of course they’d be right.
Probably.
And so it goes,
the sins of the fathers.
There are no barriers,
no boundaries,
no constant
of time
or place
so they play out
over and over
again.
https://visiblemagazine.com/the-sins-of-the-fathers/
Monday, 11 July 2022
Daisies Unchained
We buried our dreams beneath
a wreath of daisies
freed from their chains
to mark the grave
temporarily.
Waiting
for each daisy death
to hide them
for ever,
unless
someone has the key
that will release them
and make them
flower
again.
https://uglywriters.com/2022/07/11/daisies-unchained/?fbclid=IwAR12eQJ7oeBq6rYv7yD0YWm1QP7bMb8pAPlg8wFbT3zddXzY-LlVGsawUlo
Sunday, 10 July 2022
Mad Swirl
She always preferred to blend in
to the background
to lose herself
in the mad swirl of colours
from other peoples lives.
It’s how she became
invisible,
how she became
herself.
https://thedrabble.wordpress.com/2022/07/09/mad-swirl/?fbclid=IwAR1RlTRJy2wLbaTApDy0pSCavjOvxlsX90Lbe4fThyBZhssP15K4qrlK5wk
Friday, 8 July 2022
Numbers
How many times have we had this conversation?
I don’t know.
I’m not good with numbers
and neither are you.
Probably, it’s the same number of times
as we’ve promised not to have it again.
I’m not very good with promises either.
And neither are you.
How many times have we made a decision,
a final decision, that has convinced us?
Probably never,
as we’re still having this conversation.
I’m not very good at decisions either.
And neither are you.
Life has become too complex for us
and the numbers don’t add up as we’d like
them to.
We want to stop at two,
but there are other numbers in between.
So, our numbers keep on adding up to nothing.
Nothing except conversations and promises
that we don’t want or believe in.
And are unable to end.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B09XQ8WW2C?geniuslink=true
Wednesday, 6 July 2022
The Sad Man
I take my hat off to him
the sad man
of the leafy suburbs
always smartly dressed
dapper
old fashioned smart
carrying
all our problems
with all his silent grief
on pinstriped shoulders.
We all took our hats off to him
that sad man,
as we played in the streets
as we grew older
as we changed
while he stayed the same
still silent
still carrying
all those problems
all that grief
that we never understood.
https://www.pikerpress.com/article.php?aID=9165
Friday, 1 July 2022
Wishing And Hoping
The pool was clear and deep.
The children peered over the age
to see the coins glistening on the bottom.
They wondered what wishes had been made
and if any had come true
but no one could know.
No one would tell
them their wish
as they waited
to watch the coin
fall into the cascade
down into the wild white spume
and then into the clear pool below
where it would stay glistening for ever
feeling only the force of water.
All those secret wishes
revealing nothing
lying there
hoping.
http://www.youngravensliteraryreview.org/issue-16.html