Crosslight: a micro-anthology of poetry
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Glided bluff of street,
She got out a book of old photographs
& a block of speed.
Taxi cabs fly in the night,
We didn’t sleep for 3 days
Until eventually it was quick on the mattress
Boarded up eyes oozing freedom,
Wrapped up under duvets,
Irn-bru Orange fairy lights
Exhilarate the whole carriage of our bodies.
Your voice now tattooed
Across my chest, rising simply.
Can we leave all this stuff behind?
Unfolding, rolling in bass,
Where we bared our crack-dead skin.
Lovers wait on the pivot
For the drop, waiting,
To see who would survive;
Miles of fairground appear in my mind,
You gripped me like a hamburger wrapper.
But to you, back now
Is impossible; your breathed out
Air stayed on my face
For a moment. Then I sort of understood,
What people meant
When they talked about
Being happy enough.
J.R. Clarke
Elsewhere
If your thoughts were skimming stones
Smooth and flat and cold in my palm
Or your hands were a poet’s, wrist deep
Sunk in the buckets of words I keep
If your soul was a wedding ring tarnished
Thrown away in a kitchen sink
Your breath a lake that shrank and swelled
Your promises coins in a wishing well
Your disarranged clothes, my bedsheets
If your dreams were leaves on my forest floor
Or your fingerprints held me like cobwebs
Tightly pinning my arms and legs
If this, or this, or this or that
If a heart could be tamed like a cat
RME Thornhill
Descent
Last spikes of slithered ice,
down from slicing din of frozen gale, stumbling
never-to-be-trusted crisp, grip spindrifting away,
snow a hurl of frenzied bunting,
wings enclosing, to terrify, delight ) –
indifferent storm spawns,
seed-snow caresses cove, corrie, cwm,
accumulates: ice births, grows massy,
squats over sea, squashes land, grumbles down,
drags eon-gathered soil from rifts,
grinds it out to plains, retreats,
parents fertility to feed ape, ass, men,
hibernates until next need
– (cloud thinned, haven,
flirt of grouse. Silence.
Grahaeme Barrasford Young
Not Silver Not Gold
Not silver not gold
Useless things with histories dipped in blood
Give me a ring made from wood
Stolen from oak or willow or ash
So fresh, the sap still dripping
Old and rich with silent wisdom
I want tentacle roots to sink through my skin
To branch out within
Find me a ring made from bone
A vertebra, polished and clean
An ivory O like a mouth in a scream
Or a finger, curled and beckoning
A white brittle stone. Your bone
Rattling next to my own
Make me a ring from your laugh
Delicate tinkling on my hand
Like a thousand bells in a row
Shaking with mirth, making night
Look like day. When I’m lost I want it to show me the way
Bake me a ring made from your words
Knead and ply your yeses, your nos
Sprinkle in your wonderful lies then
Warm the hubbub and babble through
Leave out what you say to the rest. I want what’s
Whispered under your breath
Of wood or bone or laughter or words
Dirty metals not allowed
Make me proud
RME Thornhill
Listening to our past
Werewolves disturb glens
– power-line in storm;
orcs clank where they never walked
– clatter of guys against pylon struts;
vindictive chatter of dark elves
– hail slatting through spars;
humming trolls in chorus
– turbines boxed above our heads.
We are clever now, dismissing fears
– but these still interrupt our dark.
Grahaeme Barrasford Young
Supermarket
We will enter heaven
the same way we enter supermarkets
gawked wide eyed & lonely
oh so bloody lonely
when I shop
I feel empty
trapped
slowly shuffling pushing trolley
heavy
pallbearer for my own coffin
we are all here
making sure aspiration & lifestyles
are reflected in authentic rustic cuisine
a toothless whore smiling for the camera
there’s pretty boy Narcissus buying Casanova scents
single mother doing maths all the way round
atomic veterans stocking up leftovers
shaking heads at
the neo fat man with his fad diet teardrops of doom
crying all the way to the chip shop
middle aged suit still wondering where his youth went
middle aged couple gazing shocked dismay into middle distance
the wedding cake was the bomb!
there’s the little princess stamping
dreaming of luxurious vulgarity
young families besieged by walls of
origami cereal box art & astro-pop sugar treats
misty romantic ex-traveller now teaching comprehensive history
skipping in & out of dreamsville in between
BOGOFS, 50% free and organic something or other
an occasional tabloid philosopher wondering if we have
wasted our entire lives breathing
teenage girls gawping over the golden age of publicity
chasing flavours of the month & supergirl’s shadow
gym freak counting calories so everyone can see
fräulein fishwife for your pleasure
dinnerbreak receptionist with a letter opener in her bra
cold linoleum floor holding elderly couple close in its grasp
steel-tongued pierced starlet snarling at security guards
lauding innocence freedom & laissez-faire vegetarianism
salivating soldiers from the pic ‘n mix generation
the tramp, the broken man, heavy breathing
stalking reduced items, hiding past glory
in cold beard and holding back forgotten
soulmate tears
the modern man, caring & sensitive
rough shaven buying flowers off the forecourt
wearing long coat for the theatre
don’t pose
it’s not sexy
the standard man crucifying himself
for the cult of things
the perfect man
everything perfect
always perfect
reduced now to a moonlight voyeur out of loneliness
all just regretful souls in our new cathedrals
but then there was you
a phosphor crosslight across the crowd
sucking attention with simplicity
walking on unknown draft of salvation
flowery dress mock fur knee-length coat
former Catholic girl knees & a retrozone smile
we catch eyes
I wonder if we can run away together
from this new & improved vision of paradise
explore the origins of love, making snowstorms & huddles
swap stores
split a memory or two
then you walk past
leaving just a trail of what-ifs
hypothetical burning Venice passion evenings
long drawn sessions of debauchery
soul defining moments forged in the flicker of an eye
I guess black holes aren’t for everyone
I wonder if they have an aisle for happy endings
or sell funerals for the ignored spirit
I want to climb into the sky
forget the world
be the man who quit the human race
dance amongst aluminium angels
on top of wilderness clouds
watching hand in hand sunsets for eternity
but I’m back at the checkout
watching time on a conveyor belt
I feel empty again
left with nothing but a trolley full
& no shining light
to guide me
to help me decipher all these symbols
of fake perfection
with her fleeting masterpiece
of imperfection
I once saw.
J.R. Clarke
J.R. Clarke is a poet. Poems he has written have appeared on the internet, anthologies & sewn into the back of bus seats. You may see him reading poems at some of the more joyous festivals across the UK in the summertime. He is working on a poetics essay called I Went To The Edge Of My Mind & All I Got Was This All Consuming Urge To Write Poems Until Something Disappears & in his spare time he is an amateur hermit.
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RME Thornhill is a poet and author based in Bristol UK, and has been published in a variety of online and print magazines including Gulper Eel, Magic Cat Press and Dark Lane Quarterly Collaborative. He performs regularly in Bristol at poetry open-mic nights and at festivals throughout the summer.
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Grahaeme Barrasford Young, erstwhile editor, publisher and printer, returned to writing ten years ago after being distracted by good works and activism for twenty years. Since then he has been published in over 30 magazines.
