Tag: gender politics

Double Entendre, by Jeff Burd


By Robert Garnham 
Double Entendre 

The doctor says you’ll have to
remove your pants.  You’re 
there in the exam room with 
him  and his intern.  She’s young.  
Blonde.  Her eager eyes sparkle 
as she hovers beside him.

“Do you mind if she’s in here for this?”
the doctor asks.  “She’s got
several requirements
I don’t want her to miss.”

The intern clutches a clipboard.
You imagine a neatly typed checklist. 
This next task looms at the bottom
next to a barren, untouched little box.

It’s okay with you.  The doctor probes 
and talks his way through several 
tender angles and steps aside.  The intern 
reaches for a glove, and you realize too late 
that the ‘here’ she’s going to be ‘in’ 
is much more than the exam room.

Jeff Burd works as a high school English teacher in the north suburbs of Chicago. Mr. Burd spends a lot of time writing and thinking about writing, and worrying about not writing and thinking about writing.

 

Pissed as a Newt, by Sarah James


By Robert Garnham 
Pissed as a Newt

The pub garden has pools
of spilt sky; the wooden tables
are rotting, the fixed benches
as immovable as rock.

Shadeless windows glare
in the midday sunlight,
making bar-proppers blink
and call for reed shutters.

The day’s fight starts early, 	
with a fast-flicking reptile
tail, riling a legless lizard
lazing in the lounge.

The last newt standing 
slams down his acorn tankard
and crawls behind the bar 
to pour a fresh absinthe.

A force not to be messed with,
he lets the gravity of upturned
stools pass him by 
and hiccups another optic.

The Newton’s Inn sign 
creaks with years of rust;
two more letters fall
face-down in the dust.



BIOGRAPHY: Sarah James is a poet, fiction writer and photographer. Her latest collection, Blood Sugar, Sex, Magic (Verve Poetry Press), is partially inspired by having type one diabetes since she was six. For her, good laughter is a natural medicine. Her website is at www.sarah-james.co.uk.
 

Lukewarm, by Terri Metcalfe


By Robert Garnham 
Lukewarm
 
I’ll forget you just like I forgot all the others.
It doesn’t matter that you’re hot
with the scent of youth, distant
 
as a phantom smell.
You’ll be lukewarm like lavender on an old hankie
once these stinking thieves of my attention
have faded to memories.
 
You’re no different.
Won’t slide past my respiratory passages any easier –
my insides stained rotten as a neglected toilet bowl.
 
Look, any minute now I’ll excite your molecules
back to life, so quit staring at me.
I offer the metallic tinged ting of the microwave,
or I can easily scald a new teabag.
 

Ode to the Best Medicine, by Phil Genoux


By Robert Garnham 
Ode to the Best Medicine
 
I take it in the morning, I take it in the night,
I take it black as the gallows, l take it light and bright.
It gets me in the belly, it gets me in the face,
It gets me out of myself and back in the human race.
 
Give me your nonsense, your wordplay and your puns,
Well thought out or off-the-cuff, I`ll take them as they come.
Deadpan, dry, or epigrammatic,
Any time of day, I want to be at it.
 
Show me your innuendo and your folie de grandeur,
Rub me up the wrong way with your double-entendre.
Slap me on the arse with some Commedia-del-arte,
Hit me in the brain with your witty repartee.
 
Clownish, daft or plain idiotic,
It all feels better than antibiotics.
High-brow or low-brow, adult or adolescent:
They`re all way better than anti-depressants.
 
Off colour, dark, blue or black,
Give it a shot, because I` m up for the crack.
Salty, snarky or understated,
If it sets me off, I`ll advocate it.
 
Cringe, parodic, surreal or sardonic,
Sarcastic or bombastic, it`s all a tonic.
Juvenile, slapstick or totally hyperbolic:
All good ways to cure the melancholic.
  
So, don`t be downcast, have a blast,
Keeping them coming thick and fast.
Being miserable? I just can`t be arsed.
Because the honest truth is:  He who laughs, lasts.

Phil Genoux lives in Glastonbury. He has always enjoyed entertaining people and making them laugh. He did it for 12 years as a mime artist travelling all over Europe. Now he is using words.”

 

Bloody Crows, by Agnes Warren


By Robert Garnham 
Bloody Crows

 
My morning cup interrupted
I burst from the door
A demented whirling dervish
In a pink fleecy robe
Gesticulate wildly,
Hurl foul abuse
 
They scatter 
In all directions
A black feathered diaspora
Momentarily exiled
But ever watchful
They bide their time
Never doubt their rightful return
 
My poor beleaguered hens
Seize the moment
Occupy the feeder
Under the protective eye
Of a garishly clad
UN Peacekeeper
 
The farmer offers
To shoot one
Hang the carcass on a pole
A warning to the others
Just say the word he says
Surprised, as I recoil
  
I retreat down the rabbit hole
Of internet advice
From BB guns
To hawk shaped kites
My head spins
 
Out of nowhere they come
A grandmother's words 
Be gentle with nature
Take care of the wild things
Feed the birds
 
I stand, cup in hand
Watch, admire
My unruly visitors
 
Disgruntled hens and trigger-happy farmers aside
Equilibrium is restored

Agnes Warren lives in the West of Ireland. She started writing poetry in 2021 and participated in a series of workshops with Kevin Higgins, through Galway Arts Centre.
 

A misuse of fruit, by Anne Babbs


By Robert Garnham 
A misuse of fruit
 
It was meant to be erotic.
The strategically placed strawberries,
The cream-covered nipples,
but all I could think was
that the sheets would need changing
before I could sleep.
 
 
Anne is a poet who regularly takes part in open mic events and the occasional slam. A selection of her poems can be found in the ‘New Voices’ anthology published by Offa’s Press in 2022.
 

A Fleeting Glimpse, by Ben Macnair


By Robert Garnham 
A Fleeting Glimpse

A man going about his business.
An expression asking, Alright Mate?
A three-day beard.
A collar pulled up against the wind,
like Elvis in Vegas,
melancholic sepia
replaces the bright lights.

He has Daniel Craig’s ears.
A Peaky Blinder’s hat.
Laughter Lines.
A smile as wide as a piano,
missing all of its keys.

He could have been more,
like all of us.
He is happy with his life,
like some of us.
He knows his past is longer
than the days that remain.
Slippers, a Pipe and a loyal dog
await him at home,
with the peeling wallpaper,
the newspaper cuttings,
Rotherham’s Junior Disco Dance Champion, 1982.

 

Satan’s LinkedIn Status (Sponsored) by Stephen McNulty


By Robert Garnham 
Satan's LinkedIn Status (Sponsored)
 
Today
I wrote a letter
confessing all my sins.
 
I mean I omitted a few things
barely enough bloody ink
to address it to myself.
 
But the main things were included
Piers Morgan
capitalism
Dublin City traffic.
 
Licked it shut
stuck on
Spotify's Daily Meditation Playlist
and fed it to the flames.
 
Proceeded to cross my hooves
inhale the misdemeanors
exhale pure relaxation
 
wipe the slate clean
so to speak.
 
Then
crashed a car on the M50
chartered a flight to Rwanda
sponsored the FIFA World Cup.
 
Thanks Spotify
I've never been more #productive.

Stephen scribbles things whenever he is not forcing a member of the public into a CT scanner. His poems have appeared in A New Ulster Boyne Berries, Drawn to the Light, ROPES, Spilling Cocoa Over Martin Amis, Strukturriss and Vox Galvia.

 

Meet me at the toilet rolls, by Margaret Jennings


By Robert Garnham 
Meet me at the toilet rolls


I’m tired of meeting you at the toilet rolls
where we unravel the traffic of years 
that dragged us here

At the toilet rolls we’ll have a tryst
arguing about petty things
a tryst without a kiss

Yes, buy a new comb
to slick back your persona
but remember there’s a man 
changing light bulbs in the eaves
who is watching you

I will buy the toilet rolls
and later you will ask 
if I bought new or used

As if I would do that to you

I’m tired of meeting you at the toilet rolls


is all

Margaret Jennings is a poet, novelist and short story writer. Her novel, ‘ The Worry List’, was longlisted in the Bridport first novel award. She has been published in anthologies such as ‘The Lighthouse’ and enjoys being part of the thriving literary world in Portsmouth. Margaret’s poetry book, ‘We Are The Lizards,’ is available from Dempsey and Windle.

 

Some of the Ones, by Kate Ennals


By Robert Garnham 
Some of The Ones
after La Figlia che Piange by T.S. Eliot
 
One was a news correspondent who when stocious
whispered sweet nothings in Russian and Polish.
Each word was a rasp full of Zeds and Gizzards.
His tongue used to flick like that of a lizard
clicking like a gun, whipping my neck
so, I let him escape and moved on to Rex.
 
To be honest, Rex was not his real name
I say so because the sex was a shame
He was very attentive but had three little pinkies
and his finger work was not very kinky
I tried to use mine to work some magic
but nothing happened. It was tragic.
 
My first true love was away with the fairies
a fatal attraction for a naive young lady
He sang in a band, was charmingly late
had chocolate brown eyes, but refused to say
in words or ‘lots’ how much he adored me
so, finally, I left him and went to university.
 
There, I met a rigid boy whose body was agile
who had thick eyebrows and the sunniest smile.
He studied the Norman, Saxon, and Viking wars
And we too, were duplicitous with daggers and swords
Happily, in the end, I was victorious
but in my conquering, he grew less glorious.
 
As I got busy at work, I found my loves taken
in the office, snatched from other good women.
Their men loved my zest and liked to unzip
until one such man decided to flip.
Today, after 64 years of hard love and labour
I choose words of poetry over any lover.
 
 
 
Kate Ennals is a poet and writer and has published poems and short stories in a range of literary and on-line journals. She has published three poetry collections. You can find her blog at kateennals.com.