Amphibian – Laura Boyle

I’m an amphibian, cold-blooded; I just forget it sometimes.

I am a seventeen-year-old student, journalist, and aspiring poet. I use poetry to explore the full range of colours and sounds of the human experience; I delve into the topics that scare me most. I hope my poem finds a home in each reader.

Amphibian

Healing is a lake, and it’s a cold November day.

I feel the sand part beneath me as I stand on that border,

That static purgatory of liminality makes me shiver

Preemptively; I can’t dive in.

–

I feel the water steal the warmth of my brave toes;

Frightened, I recoil like a grasshopper, springing back onto solid ground.

The perpetual, vast wetness is the stillest whirlpool I’ve ever seen.

Still,

The anchorage of hope tugs me in,

Unwilling.

–
The torso is the worst part;

In feverish anticipation of the icy pain that begets the numbness,

I hesitate, searching for hands to pull me in.

The only hand that grabs back is my reflection.

–
The sky fills my ears and the clouds enter my lungs as I reteach myself how to

Breathe.

I’m an amphibian, cold-blooded; I just forget it sometimes.

–

I’m spinning upside-down in water or air,

Head hit by an asteroid, feet throbbing, disoriented.

Am I flying, or am I simply surrounded by the damp, frosty reflection Of the blotted sky?

–

I wish I could jump in the cerulean water head-first,

But for now, I’m taking tentative steps into the unknown,

Drowning until I believe I can swim.

Healing is a lake, and one day I will be the Loch Ness Monster.

Laura Boyle

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The Mermaid and the Concrete Sea – LW Hawksby

I turned my fins to a few different jobs

I have recently become a 1st time published memoir author and started entering my poetry into competitions. I love writing about the outdoors including the sea. The reason I wrote this mermaid poem was because I still feel ” a fish out of water” in Big Glasgow.

The Mermaid & The Concrete Sea

I left the sea and shore far behind to head past the head-land to the place they call the city land.

Wispy, young and full of childish angst, I wrapped my fins up tight and stoted angrily off into a 90’s October night.

No one held my hand as I fell into a town so grand, it took my breath away and I wished for water and waves and sand so bad I almost didn’t stay.

But I did. Of course I did.

A fish out of water, the big metal monster below my feet scared me half to death so I stuck to the streets. Walking here and there and everywhere too fearful of even a bus leaving me somewhere.

I turned my fins to a few different jobs- a nightclub (oh a nightclub!), a restaurant and bar and still to this day have never learned nor needed to, drive a car.

As the tides came and went and the year’s span round the moon, I settled down but only a little. Just enough to appear normal. Just enough to find some breathing room.

My fins fell away and I grew hooves for feet. Hard, strong and road worthy I became a city-maid. Strong, wise and sturdy. Gone is the wispy mermaid of Mull’s delicate rockpool and here is a mother. Three young mer-men all doing well at gritty but fine Glasgow schools.

LW Hawksby

My Role Model – Julie Shackman

Your shoes and spikey heels

I am a romantic comedy author from Scotland, who also writes verses and captions for greetings card companies.

My first traditionally published novel, A Room at the Manor, was released last year in Australia & New Zealand, and this year in Germany and the UK.

My next novel, The McKerron Castle, is out in audio book on 1 November.

When I’m not writing, I’m trying to wade through my growing To Be Read pile of books – and I am a stationery obsessive!

My Role Model

Powder brushes,

Glinting bottle,

Of her favourite scent,

The ghost of all her wisest words,

–

And what they truly meant.

“Chase your dreams, no matter what,”

She would often say,

With her white and dazzling smile,

–

And eyes of pearly grey.

Her amber, scratched sunglasses,

The swinging coats she wore,

As though they’re waiting for her,

–

Inside my wardrobe door.

Albums of dear photos,

Your shoes and spikey heels,

Those who suffer such a loss,

–

Know just how all this feels.

My gazing admiration,

Snuggled by your side,

Even as a little girl,

–

You filled my heart with pride.

The day you left,

Was like the final setting of the sun,

But nothing can erase the love I have for you,

……My Mum.

–

The End.

Julie Shackman, Milngavie

Burdensome Expectations – Saule Zemgulyte

No one else seems bothered

A human being with a name of Saule Zemgulyte. I identify as non-binary and am currently in Yr11. I enjoy writing and drawing. Not sure what else to say.

Burdensome Expectations

Dresses, Doll, Skirts
All feel so restrictive,
They choke me.
No one else seems bothered.
Everyone else looks fine and happy
While I wonder how they can possibly be satisfied Dragging…those…rocks…attached…by chains.
I only struggle, wishing to

discard

it.
My name–
All feminine and pink- Presses down on me.
It only gets worse
As I get older and discover more of myself.

I hate it.
it suppresses me.

A breath of fresh air.
No rules. No restrictions. No expectations. At home. Alone.
A name that’s comfortable.
In clothes I like.
Away from accusatory eyes.
Safe with a pen
That creates words
Expressing my emotions,
Allowing me to be myself.
Finally.

Saule Zemgulyte

Fears – Emma Hewston

Fear isn’t my boss anymore

My name is Emma Hewston. I am a Geography Teacher from Birmingham. Until 2 years ago I hadn’t really written (or read) any poetry since I was at school myself! I have written 2 books of poetry and am passionate about reading the inspirational poetry of others too. After welcoming our first child into our lives this summer I find myself thinking there’s a first time for everything so thought it time to share my own poetry with others too.

Fears

I am a thought machine.
I can think up disasters so big even dinosaurs scamper.
My thought disasters are quick off the mark,
Faster than me, faster than cheaters.

I am a thought machine.
The dinosaurs know my footprints
Each one pressed in beauty,
A pathway leading everywhere but to disaster.

I am a thought machine.
The cheaters know my spots
They kindly dot-to-dot in magnificent constellations
Lockets of love, no disaster here.

I am a thought machine and I think for myself.
Fear isn’t my boss anymore,
Sure I get afraid but I am more afraid of
not being true.
Being a thought machine is amazing, I thought myself here didn’t I?

Emma Hewston

Adult – Ruth McLeod

Every ‘Adult’ has not developed yet into who they are supposed to be

I’m originally from the midlands, Leicestershire & Nottingham way, but moved further south a few years ago with my husband for work. I’ve been writing creatively since I was a teenager, I’ve always been good a coming up with ideas, but never very good at finishing them, so much so that I have several novels on the go. Writing is my way of expressing how I feel and processing my emotions, sometimes I write with no intention of ever showing anyone the elaborate stories I create. Recently I have been trying to push myself to write more short-form stories and poems so that I can share my thoughts to others.

Adult

Written by Ruth Macleod

The definition of an adult is a person who is fully formed, fully grown…developed.

It has little thought or description for those who, although may seem an adult in every way may still see themselves as lost as when they were children.

Still searching.

Still hopeful.

Still entirely not ‘put together’.

–

But then perhaps this is because every adult secretly thinks like this,

Every ‘Adult’ has not developed yet into who they are supposed to be,

Or who they could be,

And I guess that is the question.

–

Who they are.

Is it who they are RIGHT NOW, this very second?

Because that person will not be the same in a week.

A month, a year, three years.

They might feel like an adult tomorrow,

But in two weeks, they may feel as lost as they did when their parents dropped them off at university for the first night.

–

A definition of an adult then becomes somewhat impossible to ever live up to.

Because to be ‘fully formed’, ‘developed’… ‘grown’.

Is to be done, baked and ready to take out of the oven.

To be all those things means that you are over,

That life is over,

And I don’t want life to be over.

I don’t want to be an adult.

Ruth McLeod

Silly Girls – Eleanor Moss

You altered my own reputation

Silly Girls

Tell tale signs you’ve got a good story to play Lay audience is lay
So come on whisper it all;
words like the morning bird’s call.
Musical Lyrical
Followed you like it was biblical
wrong interpretation: un-pieus if there’s flirtation

You altered my own reputation
Left me jolted, though presented as oblation

Take your words, you can be the tortured artist.

I’ll always be the girl that stopped you to flourish.

Eleanor Moss

A Body on its Knees – Ffion Cartwright

A heart that beats is dying

Poem entitled: ‘A Body on its Knees’ written on the London underground.

A Body on its Knees

The city is just a body on its knees, Even the snow isn’t white.
In summer when I freeze,
I kiss the morning sky;
but it is always night.
I gasped when I saw you on the street, I gave up my free seat
for you,
A heart that beats is dying,
dying for you,
And sleeping for me
The city is just a body on its knees.

Ffion Cartwright

The Blinkin’ Cursor – Elinor Clark

he wasn’t kidding when he told us all to watch the ”blinking cursor”

Elinor Clark is a recent philosophy graduate hailing from the cold and rainy North. She now works in London as a media analyst, and writes obsessively; it really is her lifeline and sustaining force. Thank you very much Elinor for sharing your talent.

The Blinkin’ Cursor

I did a double-take as the man at the front with

his combed back hair and his well-fitted blazer

and the badge on his tie which said some

words in Latin about achieving and excelling

and such things that people wouldn’t know

unless they’d been to a school with a motto.

This man who talked about maximising output

with words from a textbook in a voice he had

stolen from an American film he must have

watched about British people, suddenly, from

out of nowhere, said a word I pictured pouring

out of my Granny’s mouth, as she’d sit in her

chair, waggling a ciggie and she’d say “blinkin’ ‘eck”.

But he wasn’t kidding when he told us all to watch

the “blinking cursor”, didn’t even seem to notice

that he’d said something funny as he carried on

talking about his output and his input and the

arrow flashing on the screen, his shirt somehow

still smooth and creaseless even as he waved

his arms in wild swinging circles cutting through

the air like a fresh painted windmill.

Elinor Clark, London

The Grief in my Mind – Macee Grace Atkins

Like a broken mother, I mourned for someone

Macee Grace Atkins has had a love of reading, writing short stories and poetry from an early age. A tragic accident which resulted in the loss of a fellow student at Macee’s school inspired ‘The Grief in my Mind’. We really appreciate Macee taking the time to share her talents, and address a very difficult so topic eloquently through the medium of poetic verse.

I didn’t quite know you and you didn’t quite know me,

but somehow. The silence of the crowds,

and the parting of the clouds, made me wish you peace.

For it wasn’t meant to be.

Like a broken mother,

I mourned for someone I had not loved but somehow lost.

Trickling droplets of grief

cleansed me of the purity of happiness. Until

a single angelic sign settled on my right shoulder.

Reminding me of hope,

that of which I have for you, Aamer.

Macee Grace Atkins, 15