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A Poem A Day For A Year - 11/02/15

So I have just spent the last hour and a half typing an officiously-snitty email to my former employers. I received my final payslip from them to the tune of £16. Now true, I was off on sick with work-related anxiety and depression but still, sick pay. They expect to be able to get away with this and to leave me with £16 to live on for the month. That is not happening. Not with Valentine’s Day and Keri’s birthday around the corner. Keri is my absolute heart and soul, my lungs and digestive tract, the tendons in my ankles and my frontal, temporal, occipital, parietal, ethnoid and sphenoid lobes (or bones in the skull. I always forget which.) I will not see her go without the things she deserves because one company want to try and screw me over one final time. Things ’bout to get ugly, to quote my favourite Mark Ronson song.

That company have screwed me over at every point. When we first moved to Manchester, Keri and I were forced to work there so much we didn’t do Bunbury for months. Over the Easter and Summer last year, we barely saw each other because I was working about 50 hours a week on opposite shifts. We argued a lot and were just generally miserable. We couldn’t get out to events or really have a life outside of work. Then, as you know, over the Christmas period last year, I was suffering from anxiety and depression caused by victimisation in the workplace. This depression caused me to be not as great as I would like to be, both for myself and for Keri.

And now this. £16. I would have preferred nothing because this is an insult. It also means, as I said, we can’t really do anything for Valentine’s Day, I can’t spoil her for her birthday and I am going to struggle to get to events where we will be interviewing poets and performing ourselves. One last swipe at f**king my life, eh? Thanks for that.

It has also distracted me from this damn philosophy essay, which in one way is a good thing. But I’ve made a break-through with it! I know some words now. Words like ‘value’ and ‘welfare’. Plato, I’m coming for you!

Here is a poem. The prompt comes from VerseReversal and is ‘suppress’.

Sometimes it’s hard to suppress

the need to bend you over,

part porcelain cheeks

and extract your skeleton

through your anus.

Apologies for the graphic nature of that one. The anger of what has happened has clearly surfaced again.

Here is a(nother) poem. The prompt is ‘Without a cage’ fromWrittenRiver

Wet innocent eyes

blink furiously at brand new

blues and greens.

A puppy’s first cruelty-free steps

without a cage,

beautifully faltering.

Well that one was a little nicer. LEt’s try and keep that going with a third and final one.

Here is a poem. The prompt comes from ColdDarkPoetry and is ‘Master of Mayhem’.

The Master of Mayhem,

in his cut-sharp suit

denies through bloodied teeth,

leading order into chaos,

and soldiers into minefields.

The new issue is creeping up on us already and we are really looking forward to you all getting in touch with your submissions. The theme is Power. Come and wow us and send your work tosubmissions@bunburymagazine.com

Once again, while you are here, the latest issue and all previous issues of Bunbury Magazine are available for your discerning reading pleasure right here, including the new ‘Unexplained’ special – Bunbury Magazine – All the Issues

Also, feel free to come and check out our brand-new, almost-finished website for a sneak peek behind the scenes of what we are doing: bunburymagazine.com

And if you would like to help us make it better, there is a short survey here. Because we want to make Bunbury as shiny as possible for you! Click the link here – Bunbury Readership Survey

◄ A Poem A Day For A Year - 10/02/15

A Poem A Day For A Year - 12/02/15 ►

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