Border Business 1943-67

Theodorus Gregorius 
Apostolus Van Kempen 


and his bicycle gang 
harried the Wehrmacht


through border forests,
with sporadic hit and run


Busy fleas can make
an army itch


Now he makes them pay again
charging weekenders


a little dividend, for old times sake
The Duitsers still invade  


in droves and don’t complain
about the extra geld


his food is that good

Be careful how you use
your talking claw. 

The more shit
the bigger it gets, taking more

and more and more of what you are
to keep on top of it.

Of course words count 

unless you plan to tell the world 
exactly what it lacks

according to you 

over and over 

in detail

another Ahab 
ranting at the whale

talking crab.

Handsome dude, slick 
black eyeliner


Street kid, scruff feathered
young punk


Pale dun girl, 
neat winged sidler


Stocky boy who barges in,
no allegiances


Small picky one, 
thrower of seeds


Acrobat boy works the tree,
busy hustler


These days we have time 
to name the sparrows

I am really pleased to have recently joined Cath Drake’s 6 week writing workshop, Writing to Buoy Us, connecting 10 of us in our locked down homes across the planet by Zoom for 2 hours each week. Any sort of writing goes, with set texts to read, discuss and inspire, exercises and optional ‘homework’.

If there is interest, Cath may run another programme. Find out more at Writing to Buoy Us at http://CathDrake.com

In the lane
a thousand fireworks
each cluster
star and 
spark
a fusillade of light 
held


 

Star white flower heads,
constellations laced
in double umbels 
float on hollow stalks,
elegant engineering
combining lightness 
with tensile strength 
for beauty’s sake.

A small crowd looks up 
at the edge of the forest, 
houses only yards away,
lawns and dams and 
washing on the line.
Even as our eyes adjust
from sun to broken shade
we see nothing but trees
until, blink and you’d miss it,
a shadow half uncoils,
black tongue flickering
sifting our molecules. 


 

Inside the hedge
high inside
the green of it 
where sun lights
each 
emerald 
leaf
breathing in
all of it, all at once 
earth and green and sun
and shade 
and sharp and cool 
and bright bird song
the edge of 
a world
I am almost in

Each night the little emigre 
returns from the Island 
with tales of human cattle.
Vienna is a world away.


A life can be recast,
Jonas becomes Josef,
the dark controlled
by magic, by conjuring


brocade and painted plaster,
smoke and light and mirrors,
everything reframed
in perfect chiaroscuro.


All this in unsafe silver. 
In dreams he knows 
that none of this is real, 
not even his name.

Our writers have completed the 28 day challenge we set ourselves, five of us in the UK, and one in the US. Between us we have generated over 150 poems, or proto-poems, rich material to work up. Occasionally a gem appears, needing nothing more, complete in itself. Each of us has produced at least one.

It’s review and develop time! We will be working together, by email, Zoom, Skype, to eventually produce a collection of the best produced during these strange days. Not Covid fixated, but a record of how these days give space and time to think, and what it is we are thinking about.

Keep well and safe, and if you can, keep creating.

Colin