Week 27 – photograph by Chris Sims
Once again, thank you to the poets for sending in an interesting and poignant selection in response to the above photograph. The winner is Hanna Teasdale with Living the Dream. Congratulations to Hannah.
Poem 1
Living the dream
We were never promised the Earth
but a thousand expectations
led us to believe our
Leather-bound Dissertations
would hold their worth
Between call-centre glass,
desperate mouths gasp their
share of disaffected air. Stale
body odour and sticky fingers
pick at broken packets of digestives
Disintegrated on our way to work,
we dreamed of living
on our own: fast cars and women –
perhaps a mortgage, kids, a sofa purchased
on a Nationwide ‘Home-loan’
Twenty years of Education:
A 2:1 in Sociology from Leeds…
We were never promised the Earth
but I believed – Tony’s meritocracy,
Aspirations to be something better
than me. Debts piling on my parent’s
mantelpiece – deferment form deadlines
obligatory by June. Granny dies the moment
I find my conscience to buy stamps,
leaving me this peeling, unwanted heirloom.
Could I find a reason to stay here?
to taste salt tears of freedom,
sell surfboards barefoot in summer?
Fuck the degree, throw the debts
to the cautionary south-west wind?
Clear my lungs, hold my breath?
Smell the fear?
Live the dream?
Hannah Teasdale
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Poem 2
Hut
Everybody else’s was painted in seaside colours:
cerulean sky, viridian sea, magnolia sand
like a painting by John Miller.
Everybody else’s contained seaside things:
windbreaks, fishing nets, beach balls
all the paraphernalia for making tea.
Happy times for families – fish and chips,
ice cream and cricket on the sands.
Number 24 was our secret meeting place
hidden in plain view a million miles from …
our refuge where passion was cruelly spent
painted the true crimson of fresh blood
your urgent fingers making a heart shaped
mark around lock and bolt.
Daphne Milne
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Poem 3
Tramp in a Beach Hut
Late winter. Doors bolted. Although fresh paint
enlivens the row; a palette that sings.
Contrasting colours applied with restraint
cover peeled woodwork, the sameness of things.
Come early spring muffled couples appear.
Newly oiled hinges swing wide to the sea.
Baskets and holdalls shed sandwiches, beer,
and kettles are boiled to brew up fresh tea.
Sometimes they sell for ten thousands of pounds
despite the rule: beds forbidden inside.
Terrible price without garden or grounds.
One can not swing a cat. Let alone hide.
I live in the pink. No owner about.
I’ll stay till they have to carry me out
Angela Pickering
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Poem 4
Southwold
Summer in Suffolk strikes again
blue skies return, grey sea ever present
sandwiches and beer
a morning crabbing at Walberswick
orange spool
pop, slop crabs into the sandy bucket
now we spend a long afternoon
relaxing, watching passing boats
and fighting gulls.
Take turns to carry the tray
from the pub to the hut.
Andy Scotson
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Poem 5
Beach Mission
Like small churches
to unknown gods,
Numbers 4 and 9
Sent us out on cold days,
Ready for faith in cold sea,
Hope on hard sand,
Love for each other,
First and last and latest.
Grandad’s trousers stayed with twine,
Nan’s kettle piped like praise
In an old religion,.
Sandwiches stiff as doors
Curled in crazed plastic.
On the beach the force
Of wind made us enthusiastic
For our mission –
Cold sea,
Hard sand,
Each other.
Others now end their searches
Here to different gods.
The doors of numbers 4 and 9
Are coloured; a new phase
Begins – the course
Of wealth; fantastic
Prices, more than mine
Or grandad’s place.
I pass, praise, pause,
Like an ecclesiastic.
Cold sea,
Hard sand,
Each other –
These three,
But the greatest..
Michael Docker
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Poem 6
Trick or treat
Wall or wonder?
So what shall our life be
when we step through
the many doors of time?
Will we end up staring
at a blank wall,
live a mundane kind of life.
predictable, boring and dull,
with no great satisfaction
or achievement.
Or will the door lead to magic,
and dreams fulfilled,
a life well lived, as they say,
seizing the day,
having love and laughter,
with friends or relations every day.
Will we face each day with hope or helplessness?
What will our colour be
when we make that mighty choice?
Will the colour close in on us
and making us bluer than blue?
Or will it be yellow, bright and sunny?
And what will determine this hope,
us or our circumstances?
Trick or treat,
wall or wonder
through the many doors
of time?
Angie Butler
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Poem 7
Bathing Boxes
The railway brought shame but fashion, to Scarborough in North Yorkshire
technology at its best, Victorian men and women wearing, and
dipping from bathing machines. Soon others like Weymouth followed suit.
Morality questioned- of the mixing in, and the idea of the water polluted
by someone, dare I say it, watch my manners- peeing in the sea.
How time has moved on, if only it was pee polluting the sea!
Those plunging, tumbling dipping machines who used horses,
are at this time bathing huts, decorated in bright, loud with music,
fixed along a promenade. A bit of a distance from the sea and scantily
dressed men, women, may walk modestly to their depths.
Johanna Boal
