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love poetry life poem nature death hope war loss pain

Served by the Slice

served by the slice  

this body, cut through in the redesign for a different life,

whistles a frayed remembrance leaving naught but remnants

when falling for the suicidal hiatus of a tethered tale

 

in these days, of the child’s exultation, sing your song

as a lyrical dog chases damsons and damsels and the first and

furriest flavour the dustiest corpse of trees; dark...

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Also by Paul Sands:

Illicit | Sin by Sin |

angeragethe cult of youthwritingself doubt

My Favourite Cup

 

It takes years of pondering to find the right cup;

the right shape and weight, the pattern, the handle.

It is not just a drinking vessel

It is a portal to a world of relaxation.

Maybe I’m wrong and it is just a cup

but I’d be lost without my favourite.

 

She has picked me up when I’ve felt alone

even with her chipped rim

she makes the perfect brew.

...

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Also by Martin Bailey:

You will be mine! | Bright Star |

cuplove

MARCHING

Marching

 

The year is marching into spring,

As bright soft shoots caress the earth,

The nettles green as catkins burst.

Some gilding for a greater worth.

 

Go count your money, grasp a coin,

Buy now your place in space and time,

Rise up your monument of stone,

Or walk among the sweet sublime.

 

Today I saw some ewes with lambs,

The raw wind c...

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Also by Ian Gant:

It | Dark Knights |

Horse

 

What heavy breath escapes you;

matted creature, snorting monster–

four legged man without woman

as master;

your beard twists of licked

charcoal curls; dark- rubbed

with the rolling clouds behind.

I hear the sounds of a wet chest

strained upon the muscle

of your front legs;

an intelligent mind, outside the materials

of a humankind;

free runn...

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Also by Marianne Daniels:

Thin | Infirm | body |

Corinth (relist)

 

love is for somebody other

someone with eye blinkers like shutters

somebody else whose skin has never sensed

the crashing of all its pores

the closure of all of the doors

the suffocation of knowing

now that loves snuck in

only he has the keys

and he licks at the taste of their metals

Never had to question 

the ideas come to mind

all rose tinted

...

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Also by Rachel Bond :

cacti plant |

Last Tat Session 2012

 

Last Tat Session 2012

Today is the day of my last tattoo session in 2012.

From March to December I got so much ink.

More than you can shake a stick at.

Tarot card art, warplanes, poems and much more.

Not sure which is my fave.

Amelia Earhart’s portrait or my Boeing 40 biplane?

My arm gaps are full so I have sleeves.

Space remains on my chest,

time for t...

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Also by NICK ARMBRISTER:

One Single Wish (by Mel) | Autumn Lady | Goth Fall | Vietnam | MIRAGE | Bellyache (for Weird Harold) |

tattoo sessionbody artmy tattoo collection

now hear this

 

now hear this

 

in Zen they say there are no senses

so why then does this fish

smell like it does

if there’s no form then why

does this fish look so like a fish

if all is emptiness then why

does this fish taste the way it does

if there’s no touch then why

when I stroke this fish does

he laugh out loud and shout

see! see how we conned you?

...

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Water Underground

See rocks when running

Appearing like dark blue flashes

Skipping over wet sand

When counting these days

Seems only like a daydream

When I last climbed here

Clambered over these rocks

Up onto the hurtful grass

The stones are dry and still

Cracked and broken in fragments

Shaped in oddity, left alone

Beside there lay the gap in earth

T...

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Also by David Blake:

Seaward Citadel | Way Out By the Rapeseed Field | Angry Autumn | Castaway | Earth | Lake Song | María en la Roca (Sewage Filter) | The Dream at the Party |

2010

VANISHING POST

Is there something about mid-February...

Some mysterious shut-down day -

That sees a poem disappear

From the WOL light of day?

 

Is there something about mid-February

Like a black hole beyond the sun,

While poems that come afterwards,

Are shining "two for one"?

 

Some poems are worth reading twice

Like a letter in the post,

But here is this month...

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Also by M.C. Newberry:

THE PERFECT EXIT LINE | LABOUR MILLIONAIRES | POLICE POETRY BOOK | FEELING FELINE |

The Supermarket Veg Approach to Romance

Cor looks great

Nice n juicy

Nice n straight.

Yum – unblemished,

Will be good for me.

 

Yeuk – looks nobbly

Some bits are bad

Some bits are bobbly.

Poo – blemished,

Will be bad for me.

 

Idiot.

Read and leave comments (5)

Also by Dave Bradley:

Bedroom Tax | The 3D Printer | Cat Competition Result | Cat Competition Voting | In Praise of Mistakes |

Let's Get Fruity

 

You are the apple of my eye,

I may be a wrinkled old prune,

But I am a chunky pineapple guy,

Going to be your top banana soon,

 

You sometimes are a prickly Pear,

And treat me like a raspberry fool,

I know that life isn’t a bowl of cherries,

But I’m your kiwi – oh so cool,

 

You are as pretty as a peach,

A lovely strawberry surprise,

A melon...

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Also by Tom Doolan:

Cereal Killer | Hole In My Heart |

Warnings

 

Warnings

 

Storms!

We’re all going through storms,

From young to old you can feel the maddening -

Is this the insanity before a cull?

 

If you press your ear to the floor,

You can hear a silent alarm,

A variable bass tone resonating through

Our world,

 

It’s cold,

And the chimes from tree ornaments

No longer soothe – no longer imbue

...

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Also by Noetic-fret!:

Truth Hurts | Untitled | The Float is Dipping | The Naming Does Not Equate | Falling Petals | Mathematics | Midway and Beyond | The Intention Was All Yours | The Iron Cloth | No Gainful Loss In War Except the Feeding of the Purse |

And, naked

AND NAKED
somewhat after sonnet XXVII "Desnuda" by Pablo Neruda

And, naked, you are simple as a hand,
and smooth, and round as earth, and clear as glass;
your moonlit lines, your apple-laden land,
as naked as the naked, dancing grass.
And, naked, you are Cuba's darkest night,
whose starlight vines my tracing fingers hold.
And, naked, you are neverending light,
a summer-fill...

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Also by Marnanel Thurman:

Jesse Boot |

Frowns of Silence

(So I says to Paul Simon, 'If you can use it, use it.')

  

Hello Spare Room, my old friend,

I’ve come to sleep in you again;

I prefer you to the lounge settee

For these times I’m sent to Coventry,

Never knowing what it is what I have done;

It’s no fun

To suffer Frowns of Silence.

 

In restless sleep I toss and turned

And mulled the reason I’d been spu...

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Also by John Coopey:

Tickle Cock Lane | Progress and The Diggy Box | The Plays of William Shakespeare - (or Where I Get All My Talentfulness From) | Our Gert | "PICK IT UP" | SONNET 18 |

stay and cruise

 

(a holiday in two halves)

 

WEEK ONE

 

 

DAY ONE TO SIX…BARBADOES

 

Over liquored

Over fed

Fronded garden

Downey bed

Tiny sea-shore

Quite secluded

Luxurious

(And all-included)

 

 

DAY SEVEN …BARBADOES

 

In the deep places of the chest

Rumblings become manifest

 

And strikes the dreaded (rhyme–destroyin...

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Also by Harry O`N eill:

The anti - promiscuity calypso |

I am yours not a fate...

 

I am yours not a fate,

You are mine just a date.

 

We would better say: Whatever?

Nothing lasts forever.

Life is worth living

without any misgiving.

 

Nevertheless I say: Take care!

In your heart be fair.

Though love didn’t come,

but you were a charm.

 

You were only my passion,

my confusion, my obsession.

We can not be together

...

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Also by Larisa Rzhepishevska:

I Love You | I Remember | An Idea | Real Or Not Real |

passion

Hexakosioihexekontahexaphobia

His dog craps in my garden

to the sound of metal rock.

His kids creep round my greenhouse

scrawling balls and giant cock.

His wife is bruised and beaten

all around the fucking clock.

His preferred weapon of choice

is to hurt and maim and shock.

 

Home from church on a Sunday,

he has a bonfire burning -

pitchforking rubber tyres

and dead meat that ...

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Also by Ian Whiteley:

Soothsayer | Beneath The Watch Tower | Hostile Street | Gathering Winter Fuel | Angel of Mons | Composed At Braunau (April 20th 1889) | Club | The Collector (Roget's Soliloquy) |

bad neighbourdevilhouse saleharrassment666evil

seasonal liaisons ( senryu )

 

.
 
 
So many a winter friendship
save but a few
thaw with the sparkle of spring.
 
 
 
 
.
 

Read and leave comments (2)

My first Haiku

The small pond expands
with autumn's tepid rainfall
In ice nothing thrives.

Read and leave comments (4)

Also by Alison Smiles:

Not over til the pinny strings ping | Falling partners |

Day 27 - Spring Already

 

Day 27... of my attempt to post something new everyday (which will explain the quality)

http://tomarianne.blogspot.co.uk/

 

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Also by Tom Harding:

Day 1 - Mirrored Glass |

Forward Slash: "the weekend"

I want neon \  I want chrome  

I want car headlights, streetlights, puddles

I want loud music, I want it  louder//

I want chrome //      I want fluorescent pink         // I want inner city foxes and 3am

There’s a riot in my ribcage matches my feet pounding pavement

This city is mine.

 I want anarchy         I want a signal           

I want last orders

I am the ...

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MY LIFE

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A little bohemia in Warwick

 

 

“Remember these times.” Urging me earnestly

whilst you nuzzle my hair down there.  I dizzy and delight

at your glasses still on. A wicked glint behind

magnified - tantalizes. I draw breathe, thighs tense.

I protest “No, no, you can’t do that it’s the wrong time of….”

 

You can. You will. You do. Body squirming, eyes wide,

I clutch the duvet, horrified. Yo...

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Also by Katy Megan:

The Oak Tree at Hatton Locks | Extra Hot, Extra Wet, Extra Shot | Anthony and Katypatra |

lovelove poetrylove poemerotic poetryerotic poem

The One I Love

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

If ever you

doubt my

love,

look into

my eyes.

 

The sparkle

you see

in them

is my

love for you.

 

If ever the

sparkle diminishes,

do not fear.

 

My love

is not

gone.

Only that

my health

has diminished.

 

 

A little late for valentines,

b...

Read and leave comments (3)

Also by Shirley Smothers:

The Emergency Room Visit | The Ole Fishin Hole (Haiku) |

lovehappiness

ThePoetry Spoke February - Poetry Night & Guests

  'ThePoetry Spoke'

Great poetry and acoustic music

This Tuesday - 26th February- doors open 8pm

 

La Gondola

22a Liscard Crescent

Wallasey- The Wirral

CH44 1AE (a stones throw over the Mersey from Liverpool)

Check us out in the gig guide...

 

Our Guest Poet

Ged Thompson

Ged's poetry questions life. Poetically it does this via the telling of tales...

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Also by Chris Co:

Wirral Ode Show - Open floor Night - February | All things considered | Life |

Chance to get your work heard

Hi

 

I am posting this for a friend of my hubby who has just started a weekly podcast. He's a good lad who used to play in a band with Mark so show some support and get your submissions in . It's mostly for new unsigned bands but they are looking to include spoken word performance too.

 

Kath

 

Hey folks

Blown away by the response from our first podcast. For those w...

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Kate Middleton.........Leave her alone !

Leave Kate alone,leave her in peace,

As an heir to the throne she is soon to release.

To give birth to your first is such a strain,

Leave her alone don't disturb her brain.

 

Instantaneously admired,a star in the making,

In love with Prince William,the intense responsibility she is taking.

Compassionate and loving,beautiful and great,

Leave her alone to peacefull...

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Also by hugh:

A lost glove | Appendicitis ? | Hilda hath no fear | Barclay's in Bletchley-sliding doors shut on 85 year old ! | Sun or moon ? |

Banksters

It’s not the same for banksters,

The real gangsters,

Never wind up in handcuffs.

Behind scandals, there’s board rooms,

And JP Morgan goons,

That don’t care if you choke on the fumes,

Of their cooperate joyriding,

As long as you keep abiding,

 

By standards they’d never live by,

Like eating a steak pie,

That’s 99 per cent horse and 1 per cent fly!

...

Read and leave comments (1)

Also by Wez Jefferies:

Close calls and near misses | The river | A civil war, where the mind is as powerful as the gun |

politicsbanking crimesrhyme

Baking bread in Birkenhead

Baking home-made bread in Birkenhead,

Cannot be justified.

I have tried.

Except in the unlikely event

If not paying rent

One has to sell the homely pride

Enticing would-be vendors to come inside.

 

Baking bread in Birkenhead is fun, amusing but time consuming.

The competition on this grey February day

Is Halo 3 extended play

An assault on a young boys...

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Things Half Said

 

Looking back over all the things I’ve printed on the page
there seems to be gap between the truth of what was felt
and what’s imagined
The words came while I was still questioning the validity
but what I then went on to feel was always with such certainty
 
There is a space between
there is a space between you and me
filled with things half said
 
S...

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Black and White.

 

Black and White.

 

Gathered for a photograph in four ascending rows, and

guided by their teacher’s gaze, a class of vocal children pose.

All the boys are standing up; all the girls are seated;

variously polished, buckled, brushed and neatly pleated.

Blinking in the drenching flash they dim their grin-contorted faces,

bustle back to classroom tables chattering a...

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Polishing a Turd

 

Shite they say is such a dirty word

It conjures up all sorts of images

Brown, sticky and smelly vestiges

But can you polish a turd

 

I think you can, it is not absurd

To think you can make something better

To think you can improve the design

To think you can create something new

From something which reminds you of poo

 

It took a long while for ...

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epiphanypoetrypoemturdaPolishing

Bury me In the Clouds

 

 

 

A person can change, right?
I'm a leopard neglecting my spots for sport
& shedding skin, trying to forget or misplace my immoralities.
I was born in brawls & cut from the knuckle of enmity
ended with a parting shot.
I've been loved, spat out and tattooed by the system you applaud.


Now I'm looking for a way out.
a second chance I thought was you.
If I can ...

Read and leave comments (0)

Also by Memoir.:

A state of Californication. | Hawthorne. | William, It was really Nothing. |

As it flows

As the river flows,

This life source,

In  torrents swelled  to destructive force.

New paths gouged, etched against it's might,

Cleansing the deadwood, new life blooms in the light.

Debris swirls, caught in it's girth

reclaimed, broken, clambering for earth. 

An emotional torrent of change.

 

As the river flows,

This life source.

In meandering paths et...

Read and leave comments (3)

Also by Tracey Bucknell:

The Language Of Love |

ALERT

WHAT IS GOING ON WITH THE BLOG 'UNIT'! THREE COPIES OF EVERYTHING, AT LEAST.

Read and leave comments (2)

Also by Cynthia Buell Thomas:

The Gay Dinosaur |

A story to the plants, that made them blush. Teaser

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I am currently writing my first short, 5 poem Collection of poetry "A story to the plants that made them blush" is coming out in summer 2013 it will be available from me at "Poetry, Prose and Pints" events or through contacting me. It will be a simple paper leaflet costing 50p with any profit going to charity

Here is a teaser poem from the collection and ...

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Soul Music

Suppose there are souls that really exist

in eternity on the other side

where 24/7 evangelists

promise death to those who bridge the void.

 

Suppose them sitting in homes and cities

in their virtual, spiritual forms.

Would their ghostly, gaseous entities

risk it all for a stirring of warmth?

 

Suppose that a soul accessed a peep-hole

and observed you ...

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Also by Ray Miller:

Potted History | When I Was Your Father | My Favourite Glass | Wards |

Siren

 

Siren

 

You parade her photos before him,

proof that your mother’s beauty was not a daughter’s delusion.

Side by side in one snap,

He ignores you at 14 unlovely as a juvenile bird,

but ogles her film star pout.

 

So you are hurled back to that day

she bowled up to college in scarlet sports car,

snatching the gaze of the boy, who had replaced Donnie ...

Read and leave comments (1)

Also by fiona sinclair:

Bed Snatcher |

Team GUM at Riff Awards/Riff News

Team GUM are taking on the Riff Awards.

Step 1.

Like the Riff page here: https://www.facebook.com/RiffMediaUK

Step 2.

Send an email to: adam-ruane@hotmail.co.uk

Put forward Kris Fogg for BEST NEWCOMER.

Put forward Ushiku Crisafulli for BEST NON MUSICAL ENTERTAINER.

You'll see us both repping Riff at RIFF SURVIVAL SUNDAY - MARCH 31st

Cheers,
Ushiku.

Read and leave comments (0)

RiffRiff AwardsRiff Survival SundaySurvivalSundayRockMusicComedySpoken WordHip HopCountryVarietyAwardsIndependent MusicIndependentLocal ArtistsLocalArtistsMusiciansKris FoggKrisFoggUshikuUshiku CrisafulliThe Five Faces of Fulli

Infatuation

 

 

Inflow of confetti, brings happiness and fun

Newly wed romance in the August sun

From the valley of dreams, mid the hills and dales

Azure the sky and green the vales

Tantalizing melodies in the afternoon air

Unaware of love lingering everywhere

Against the backdrop of a cloudless sky

The snow capped mountain stands so high

Infatuation or love? A beaut...

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Also by Hazel Connelly:

A Day In My Life | Rose Maloney | Untitled |

One Night I Stole a Purple Balloon

 

One Night I Stole a Purple Balloon

One night I stole a purple balloon

From a cheaply decorated nightclub

I was pissed out of my mind so it looked pretty

And taking it seemed a good idea.

 

When I tied it up at home

Like a child decorating for a birthday party

I did not expect it to be there for long: balloons

Tend to run out of air or escape when you lo...

Read and leave comments (6)

Valentine's Dayextended metaphor

VALENTINES

VALENTINES

 

What starts as romance

Ends up as routine

With variations

For years in between

Anonymous cards

Carefully picked verse

Until you just sign

For better or worse

And each time you try

To write your own lines

You find out how hard

Are good Valentines.

 

 

Copyright(C)David Subacchi 2013

 

Read and leave comments (1)

Also by David Subacchi:

INDIGNITY |

SUBACCHILiverpool poetryValentines

Almost from the beginning

 

 

 

The first few times we met
Was under a crossing of invisible bridges
Watching the boats setting out
For distant isles,
Plunging our love
Into a monochrome
Of steered moonlight.

 

The first few times
Was buried in half baked clues
Pressed tight in your eyes
And whispered words
Sometimes lost
Under droning boats
But never your intent,

 

...

Read and leave comments (2)

Five Shadows on the Floor

 

Five Shadows on the Floor
 
Frank was a wanted man
He had broken somebody's law
But he didn't take shit from no one
Especially five shadows on the floor
 
Charlie and his boys were waiting 
For Frank in the corner of the bar
Amy was wiping glasses when 
She heard the roar of Frank's car
 
She got an old fashioned glass ready
Because Fran...

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The purple play

The play has just ended,
the curtain dropped
and the applause ceased.
One after the other we get
out of the blue theatre
of this crowded evening.
Everybody will remember
a different story to tell,
according to the seat
of their own
point of view.
And all of us will forget
something: a character,
a cue, the colour of a voice
or the notes in a gesture
we didn’t list...

Read and leave comments (3)

actstheatreplay

My Cousin Rosebud

Razor walking, Quick Street talking, really cutting edge

hedge your bets against that a quick, humdrum, cum moment.

The rattle, tattle, big bang, don’t dillydally,

on your way home moment.

 

Now, its eyes down for a full lickty spit,

split right down the middle like my cousin Rosebud

a clickity, dickity girl with yesterday in her hair.

 

Rosebud, who keeps Ec...

Read and leave comments (3)

Amy

The breath had left her, not long ago.
Her face, pressed into the pillow
Drained black tears onto white linen.
Her fight had been lost; the long battle had ravaged her
And her iconic war paint scrawled ironic defeat in tracks
Down her pale skin onto paler sheets.

A motionless husk; as she lays there;
Her raven hair, unravelled from familiarity,
Fall's delicately on her back,
...

Read and leave comments (2)

Also by Simon Austin:

Lost |

deathaddictionalcoholiclonelinesslondonfamecelebritypoem

For A Short Time.

Death is the final refusal.

 

It discards the giggle of time,

that beast with a stretch

the length of a universe.

 

The strong silent type of dark matter

and the blush of unfinished principles,

of critical strings.

 

Important as every heart attack there ever was,

some believe the concept

a messiah of numbers.

 

True freedom may appear as ...

Read and leave comments (2)

Also by Kealan Coady:

The Perfect Communist Reproduction Of The Natural World | In Defence of Light |

Depends

So much depends

on the

little nut

that holds

the wheel

on the

red wheelbarrow

(Apologies to William Carlos Williams)

Read and leave comments (7)

red wheelbarrow

Total Art

Total Art….he art...she art……soulful hearts…..open arms…….vocal craft…..motion dance…….oceans calm…………Notions of the dark….like Napoleon….blown apart……….focus sharp…..fire opal vase……..golden mask……………ghosts of ones selves past……nations reincar…..woeful gasps…emotions scarred…..ter disa………. souls un-charred……wondering star…..melodious bars……opulent spark…….associate all parts…..ahh the holy who...

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speakeasymanchesterChriSJaMspoken word

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