Guest editor: Andrew Scotson
Poems by Colin Bancroft, James Laurie, Nick Cooke, Cihan Serce, Lizzie Ballagher, Moira Andrew and Gill Lambert
Photographs by Chris Sims.
• Archive of all Poetry Space showcases
Editor’s overview
I very much enjoyed reading the large and varied selection of poems submitted for this showcase, and the many topics chosen. I also loved the many different styles and forms. My one criticism is that some poems were simply too long. Sometimes less is more and poets need to get an image across whilst keeping the reader’s interest.
Please scroll beyond the poems for my feedback.
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Wheatfield with Crows
That summer, in Auvers-Sur-Oise, he watched the wheat fields change,
Catching the shift of light in his paintings, as though in some strange
Way they represented him, his life. He arrived in the village subdued
By storms. He craved to be rid of Saint Remy, hoping for a solitude
Expressed in the letters he sent home. He took a room at the Auberge Ravoux,
Bed, dressing table, cupboard, and from the window he admired the view
Of the thatched cottages and the railway bridge. Each day he walked
Out into the countryside, stumbling perchance upon a field stalked
With wheat, capturing its beauty underneath a thundering sky
And each day he would return there to paint the field, by and by
The thunder lifted from his mind, to be replaced by clouds, clearing.
All the time the harvest of his wheat was nearing;
And no one will ever know why that morning he chose
To fire the gun and set to flight the blackened shroud of crows.
Colin Bancroft
‘All day it has rained’
The garden licks cracked dry lips – at
the first teasing drop, it lies limp, open-limbed
in glorious surrender.
In tubs and pots, flowers shudder with
pent-up desire, eyes closed, as they gulp down
every last warm drop.
Colours spiral out of control, for gold
read grey, for yellow, gunmetal – green multiplies,
deepens to almost-black.
Unremembered sounds – a whisper in the grass,
a shushing of high-hat brushes, the surge and spit
of overwhelmed drains.
In forgotten colours, in stripes and dots,
flushed umbrellas bloom, monstrous mushrooms
thrusting into liquid air.
Tongue slack, lips swollen, the garden relaxes
under a watery sun, in the heady aftermath
of wanton indulgence.
Moira Andrew
Lemon Light
Day comes up full of willow buds
Yellow as yellowhammers
And dusts the grass with daffodils,
With flaring saffron crocuses.
Between long cirrus clouds, citrus light shakes out
The splash & flash of goldfinch wings.
An early brimstone butterfly ascends
Creamy yellow on skeins of invisible updraft:
Away, it lifts away, drifts away
Over banks brimming with primroses.
And now on the morning of the springing clocks,
Here in this first week of a northern spring,
The flame has turned,
Sun’s fire has burned
From winter’s crimson plum
To spring’s bright lemon light.
Lizzie Ballagher
How I Want To Be Remembered
Sometimes my dad would get drunk, red wine usually, sometimes rum and coke. A habit he
said he picked up from a folk festival he once went to in Portugal. I remember he just said he
had this vision of Dulcimer stuck in his mind. Dulcimer in a bikini. Dulcimer in a bikini,
crashed out on a sunlounger.
Dulcimer in a bikini, crashed out on a sunlounger,
with a
bottle of Captain Morgans by her side. That’s my dad he
always had ‘a thing’ for fiddle
players.
And when he did drink, the stiffness and awkwardness would disappear and, in those
moments, he would open up and shine. I remember that night he showed me his records
and we enthused over the vinyl and the picture discs, the album sleeves and the artwork and
the little brush he taught me how to use to clean the dust off the old LA Guns album before
crashing guitars filled the room from grooves of the black spinning disc. I would never have
dreamed of the magic of that little black brush, how something so small and innocuous could
sweep away the years of dust and wipe the slate clean, releasing the sounds and the
memories from another era. His era.
And from there who knew what might unfold? Ticket stubs, photos, autographs, picture
discs, stories, poems and poetry books would come pouring out. We’d talk about art and
music, read poems and stories until, at some undefined point, the spark would just go out.
Without warning. That was it. And I always waited and I always wished it would return
James Laurie
Father
I walked past you yesterday
I saw something in your eyes that I hadn’t seen for some time
It looked as though you were hungry
Maybe you were
Your clothes were ragged
and you needed a shave
There was a faint smell of ale emancipating from you
No, it wasn’t faint, just familiar
Were you my father?
Did you have a father?
Or just a mother?
You never answer me
I still don’t understand just who you are
Or why my eyes are drawn to you
each time we cross paths
Cihan Serce
Behind every door
From the top-deck, windows wink –
no wonder, they’re the keepers of secrets,
only they know what goes on behind
closed doors.
Think of the small day-to-day secrets –
where the tea-bags are kept, the box
with spare string in, the half-bottle of Gordons’,
spoons, screwdrivers.
Sometimes it’s more embarrassing,
the stash of condoms, lacy black bras
and knickers lurking in the bottom drawer –
just in case.
The cloned semi looks so innocent,
geraniums burning in their baskets
by the door, a teddy bear sitting on
an upstairs sill.
Like unwilling observers, windows
bide their time, keeping up appearances
as they brood over broken promises,
cracked hearts.
When the going gets tough, they
drop blinds like eyelids, pretending
not to notice lost tempers, flying fists,
tempestuous tears.
If they find a guy hanging from
the loft-space, neighbours shake their
heads in disbelief, kept himself to
himself, they say.
With not so much as a second glance,
we pass these rows of houses, blue doors,
red doors, an abandoned bike, windows
shining in the sun.
Moira Andrew
Trigonometry
The boys from school are building houses.
One’s on the roof, the other’s putting
windows in. Mates now, though back
in class they hardly spoke. Banter
falls and rises through the floors; seeps
into damp plaster on the walls.
Ninety degrees and rising on the tiles, he wipes
the sweat away and smiles as she walks past –
he’d know that wiggle anywhere, though
it’s years and years since he was there.
She’s not yet past her best and well aware
that she’s still turning heads.
Looking up, she sees him, familiar
through the grey and lines of middle age.
It comes back to her – a sweet, brief fling
at seventeen. Dropping her gaze,
she catches another face, framed
in a brand new window.
The earth tilts, her heart rate hits
its apex, a million secrets pass
between them in one look.
Touch and taste and smell in equal
measures. She walks away, her world
back on its axis, their lives in parallel.
Gill Lambert
On meeting a celebrated author
All day, his star quality has been
Quietly apparent: the trim, lean figure,
The glove-like suit, that famous creased grin
So querying of himself and of the world
That every word is a shrug, a raised eyebrow.
By his side, others, equally fêted,
Seem to slouch, look their age, not to have heard
Of a single type of ambiguity.
And this is why they’ve seated him
In the exact centre of the room, although
In terms of the greatest prize he should give way
To someone more peripherally placed.
As I rise to make my speech, his eyes
Are first sympathetic, then steely,
And when I seek to evade them I find
He is my Big Brother. Afterwards,
Despite my sense he’s now avoiding me,
I insist on shaking his hand. Nice speech
Comes from the grinning lips. And in the forty
Or fifty seconds he grants me I can tell
Everything I might want to know – the bemused
Nature of his grip on the mantle,
And the lack of fire within: both the source
Of his elegant strength, and the very cause
Of the skilfully concealed stagnation
I’ll bet he self-acknowledges every night,
Slowly unknotting his tie… The critics
May not agree with him, but have they grasped
The limits of his ambition? I felt
I did. Meanwhile, the crumpled rival
Had long since taken flight: no doubt to seethe
Himself to sleep, and awake in flames.
Nick Cooke
Last day of summer
Summer stretches into the distance,
lizard-greens unfold
on the trees.
We have hope … sit in the sun,
share the first sweet fun-sized
strawberries.
We watch swallows abseil
the skies, bluebells unfurl, pinks flaunt
frilly knickers.
We watch poppies fire up
their brief lives, flirt scarlet skirts,
lipstick smiles.
Next up, June sunshine scorches
the grass, days leaking past in
a haze of heat.
Begonias and geraniums march
into a fierce July, spelling mid-summer
in capital letters.
We see rudbeckias unwind, sunflowers glow,
their serious eyes blinking
against the light.
Summer seems forever …. until August ambles
round the corner, the rains come …
forget to stop.
Exhausted flowers lap it up, sucking, gulping like
hungry babies … heads drooping
to sleep it off.
Now, on this last day, the sun remembers
its manners, teasing, burnishing pale petals,
lack-lustre leaves.
Losing hope, we snatch at late sun … watch the farmer
make hay … dry yellow grasses spewing
from a red tractor.
Moira Andrew
Conversation North of Home
North of home we left our shoes
At the end of the broken boardwalk
And stepped onto the sand as onto holy ground:
Barefoot beside that ageless water
Of time, of change, of passion—
Barefoot and silent by the fast gathering ocean,
The steely Atlantic looming north
And the sun shooting point-blank in our eyes.
Blinded by that sun your eyes framed
Only the brilliant gloss,
The gritty softness under sinking feet:
Impossible to see ahead to future shores.
But I, so dazzled yet by you, could see
Not sand, not sky:
Only hear birds pattering
In mocking emptiness behind.
Turning east again we wondered
At the crazed grey footmarks on the sand
And I said, Are those the steps of the sane?
And you said, No indeed:
And stretching over the dune
To pick one last purple flower, you said,
Don’t let me go, now,
And I said, I never will.
Lizzie Ballagher
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Editor’s notes
Wheatfield with crows
I enjoyed the story telling style and the atmosphere created in this piece. It has an ominous feel; you can almost smell the corn and see the clouds gathering. The last line reminds me of the Don McLean song and I’m sure this was intended.
‘All day it has rained’
In the current heatwave, the whole piece has us becoming the garden, feeling the thirst, the growth, seeing the colours and the vitality.
Lemon Light
I particularly like the repetition and the quick fire rhymes given to us, “splash and flash of goldfinch wings” draws the exact image in your brain. Each flower and plant become crystal clear.
How I want to be remembered
I love nostalgic poems and stories about old records so combining the two was a winner with me. It reminded me of my own father and times listening to scratchy dusty old records. A simple story, very much enjoyed.
Father
A chance meeting with a stranger. the smell of alcohol, eyes following the person on the street. Lovely, albeit sad portrait.
Behind Every Door
A story of a journey and of observation. The casual, almost comic style and the precise description “small secrets” behind the blinds leads me to imagine the million things hidden by “blind like eyelids”. This is a great read.
Trigonometry
A different view of the building site scene, we see him and her and get an image of the emotions connecting the two.
On meeting a celebrated author
This piece paints a very realistic picture of this meeting and draws us into the situation. You can visualise the room and imagine the conversation.
Last day of summer
A tale of seasons. We see the progression precisely and beautifully described in very few words. I like the verse about the poppies in particular.
Conversation North of Home
This poem is a blend of sight and feeling, the sand, the sun, the reflections and the light. My personal favourite from the selection I found it atmospheric and it made me want to read more work by this poet. I did not fully understand the whole piece yet loved the overall feeling it evoked.
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Andrew Scotson is 54. He lives in Daventry and is married to Jeanette. He has a degree from Leicester Polytechnic and lived in Leicester for 40 years. He loves nature and hill walking in particular.He has climbed 72 Scottish munros and all of the big lake district mountains. He enjoys reading and history. He writes a lot of poetry, some of which has been in anthology collections and on line magazines. He works as a transport planner for a major supermarket. He previously worked in independent record shops for many years. He has just had his first pamphlet collection published by Poetry Space.
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