New EU president,

I think I like you,

with your monthly monastic retreats,

your writing of Flemish Haiku,

your poetic name; Herman Van Roempy,

the man who’s made Tony Blair’s supporters grumpy.

They said Blair’s key credential

was that he is properly…Presidential.

But second time round in the jungle,

there can be more to fear,

and Tony might have spent all his summits

thinking; “I’m a Celebrity,

get me out of here”

Up North

As Leonard Cohen nearly said,

stop mithering,

I was born like this,

I had no choice,

I was born with the gift of a Northern voice,

I know hearing it makes some people groan,

and develop Irritable Vowel Syndrome

but I’d consider it deeply cruel,

if I woke up sounding like Brian Sewell

If you want your message to sound down to earth,

a Northern accent’s the one to use

but I hope one day,

to hear the bongs strike ten,

and a Northerner reading the news.

I met a Daily Telegraph journalist

in Hull once,

it was the furthest North he’d ever been,

he was okay once he’d been issued,

with a passport

and a translating machine.

A Northerner is allowed to host

TV’s Culture Show,

but it’s alright cos she used to be in pop

and just by looking at her you wouldn’t know.

If you escaped to Oxbridge in the fifties or sixties

from a Northern bog or a kitchen sink,

you’ll have left your short “a”s

up a ginnel somewhere

in case they impeded your ability to think.

Though in case anyone disputes

your Northern roots,

they’ll return sometimes

when you’re on the phone

to folks back home.

or you’ve had too much to drink.

Wordsworth came South

and his Cumbrian tones

made people think he was a fool,

so he reflected upon his inward eye,

and sent his nephew to public school.

But I can’t complain,

cos even with my voice,

I’m poeting on the BBC

though a version of this poem

will be written down

and translated into R.P.

Janes, Jamie,

not Jennifer Jane,

names,

James,

miss, missing

when you lose

you lose your ane

your aims

names

trying to say the right name

that is how

I do feel, I do feel her pain

miss Janes

blames

me.

Dustclouds form as

words

disperse in helicopter flail.

Her son’s blood

inking sand.

Lack, lack, lack,

gunning in her head.

His body incomplete,

a word

with the last letters

crossed out.

(Here; http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#/group.php?gid=95060877210 )

 However, I’ll continue to post poems here too. Recent events at Cheltenham Lit Fest and Durham Book Festival have generated some great examples of the genre. On Tuesday afternoon at Durham’s Clayport Library, nine of us sat down to write first short Saturday Live style stabs, then longer pieces based on events we went and scouted for in Durham city centre. The idea of an event as the basis for a news poem was illuminated further by a Tyne Tees journalist filming us- I though the process of gathering images to illustrate a story was what we would do too. With the advantage of being able to actually witness the event and report it as poets- rather than come into the story half way through as most reactive journalists have to.

Dangerous

Fading in his ear, the beep of a cardiac monitor,

the last machine that would amplify him.

Racing then slowing,

locked in a rhythm he couldn’t control

while millions of hearts still pumped to the beats he had set.

There’s alot he would want the world to forget

but the music survives,

this soundtrack to our lives.

From Detroit to Durban,

Dhakar to Durham,

from a musician of fusion

and confusion

Disco, rock, soul,pop,

making the tribal division of dances stop

himself the incomplete reflection

of his reach for musical perfection

 a blending,

an extending.

Flowing across boundaries,

is dangerous,

freeing,

new ways of hearing,

new ways of seeing.

He’s in the photo albums of our lives too,

this  boy who didn’t predict the man.

slowly chiselling himself away,

disappearing in a light display,

revealed in a mask,

and the questions the world had to ask.

We saw him in the black glasses,

the ambulance and the white shroud.

Is the picture as clear

as the music is loud?

Should we separate music from the maker,

make it our own,

translate the universal language

of the tambourine or the trombone

into rhythms that move us

in blood and in bone?

Kate Fox.

(I thought I’d compromised quite alot there when I agreed to rewrite “more about the music”…but having read Maya Angelou’s words I feel much better…)

Now Class ‘09 has graduated
The prom is over and they’re all wasted
Destined for the bitter fruits their parents tasted
Come back Prozac – Gotta keep ‘em medicated

Keep the little fuckers high so they can’t see
Their future consumed carefully by degrees
They were never really going to study – silly.
Take the only thing they will give you for free
They come guaranteed
To take the edge off your lack of liberties

Heat wave warnings won’t affect the frozen grants
Which means less than no chance
At all for those with brains but no healthy balance
They will be the first to fall but not to chance

So much for all that shit about Education,
Aspiration, and some other sion, you nearly led us all on
Class of 09, what’s left for you when the summer’s gone?
Sing it with me – Sign-on Sign-on Sign-on

Carmen Thompson

Stay Neda
Sing with your people in the streets
Say Long live life!
Down with death!
Tell the sun to shine
Tell the cold to depart
Do not go Neda

Stay Neda
Look at this city
At the shaken foundation of palaces
How tall are Tehran’s maple trees
The “dust” has made
the air bad for the oppressor
Do not go Neda

Do not be afraid
It is the sound of fireworks not bullets
It is a spark for a fire
We are on fire
We are the fire
Due to batons and gunshots
We are a blazing fire
Do not go Neda

Oh Neda, oh Neda
Breathe
Rise
Knock on the cage
Break through the bars
Do not go Neda

Do not go Neda
Wait
Look beyond the clouds
Lady sun wants you to come
She is just like you, but
Do not go Neda

Pete Williamson

at Wimbledon close is

 it gets rid of Cliff,

but not the shadows. 

KF

 The crowds gather in S W 1

All keen to cheer young Andy on.

Scotland’s current sporting hero

is hoping not to leave with zero.

Fans await the moment of truth.

When will they close that bloody roof.

Crispin Fisher

On this day, June 25,
the day Custer was killed,
North Korea invaded its Southern neighbors,
the human genome was released

a man died
from a heart attack
in Southern California
one of 900 to pass
from the disease
nationwide this day

He was the husband
of my wife’s golf partner,
70 on a business trip
to San Diego

one of nearly 165,000
who died worldwide
during the day

and didn’t become the news

The child is often
exotic scar tissue
In art
Its where neurosis makes its start
Formed by unmet needs
And endless pain
Out comes the showman glowman
To make a “gain”

Who would have thought
No eyes of parent empathy alters worlds
Or voids create a future contrary
That children are forced to scar themselves
And play at becoming a distorted fairy ?

Well….

For instance :

I’ll play at dropping baby
And be an outlaw of dancing grace
And mangle my appearances
To show my father’s sad disgrace

In adult worlds I’ll never land
Because care and childhood bridges
Have never spanned
And no-one really gives a hand
To Peter Pan
In Hook’s pen

And elvish sexuality
Of magics beds
And pedophilia media
Will have the power to race past
And just condemn

Go child to the thrones of sin
For redemptive antidotes
To be forgiven
For the showyboat of the world everyone is in …