You stepped outside? I envy your courage. I’ve been indoors for two days, Like a houseplant someone forgot to water. Did the world transform without me? Are there new kingdoms? New laws? Does the sun still clock in for work?
I stepped out. It was dark And wet I wished for a new kingdom And new Laws None were there And neither were you In that dismal Anticyclonic gloom
I give you this glass half-full trite platitude
The sun clocks in , Like the ghost of flexitime, At that point in the day When you and I Shall meet again And share boiled sweets And fond words
Will the moon sail up and will the moon shine And tell me dark secrets and if I tell her mine? What a stupid request Because the moon is quite deaf.
Will the moon sail up and will the moon shine? She took of some clothes So I threw off all mine Which was patently dumb Because the moon is quite blind.
Were we were destined to be second best, Paranoid and in a mess? Good love some times ends like this.
Will the moon sail up and will the moon shine Or cover our bodies in angry quicklime? She has so many lovers and so little time For us.
Was it you and me or the stars Which made us curse each other’s names?
You and me. Wherever we end up Whoever we love just know there is one who still thinks well of us.
You ask Will the moon sail up and will the moon shine? Will the moon sail up and will the moon shine Sweetness?
Time after time After time After time.
Another two hander. Originally a song but I think it sort of works here. It’s actually meant to be optimistic!Art by Dawn Illing
Why ‘End’? End as in die? Does a poem end? It can if no one hears it Or loves it Or thinks about it Or talks about it Or it gets buried by time Or jealousy Or malice I do not wish an end to your poems End
To tease a man who writes ‘End’ as a termination to all his poems
They’re all so bloody… Coffin-hued or ashen grey Like a party done and cleared away. I dont want beige with a wilting font Or a corny gag about booze Or jabs at old women With creaky knees or sagging tits. This shop is shit. Try another…it’s just the same. But I want colour! A card that shouts, “You’re still here!” A bit of cheer…a little brash Not a eulogy with a limp blue sash.
To the corporate card sellers With your racks of bland sorrow: Come tomorrow In that revolution I may yet live to see (though I am somewhat accepting of the idea I may not) Your aisles will not be spared. I’ll torch the lot In flame, not verse I swear this curse!
At the time of this interview, Feaven Chae (‘Heavenly Spicy Tea’) was nearly 14. She had been at our school for six months and her English had developed remarkably since her arrival in Bexleyheath in the back of a lorry in October. She wasn’t in any of my classes, but I was asked to interview her for the school radio show during a month when PSHE lessons focussed on slavery, refugees and human trafficking.
I was told Feaven was talkative but reticent, that I was unlikely to get much out of her because she just wanted to be an “ordinary Thamesmead girl” …as if such a creature exists! As soon as that microphone was on I couldn’t stop her! This skinny, delicate looking girl with her newfound love of K-Pop, had a core of steel and a story she wanted to tell.
Our radio station is run by year 8 and, given some of the content, it was decided not to broadcast the interview; so it got forgotten on a hard drive. Here is an attempt at a transcript of the first part.
You might imagine the mood during the interview would have been rather down and depressing, but there were a lot of smiles and laughter…and just occasionally tears. Feaven is a happy, outwardly carefree girl, she has come through what I hope will be the worst part of her life, has loads of friends…and knows how to make them! She’ll do well.
I felt a bit out of my depth…particularly when she was so unexpectedly honest and open about the very nasty things she witnessed and experienced. Other than being a moderately good listener, I was simply not qualified. I’ve edited as little as possible; only adding a bit of punctuation, and a removing couple of disturbing or personal details at her request. I have also changed her name… unnecessarily so, for the bright girl said she had changed it a few times already.
Why did you have to leave Eritrea?
‘Cos I didn’t have any good quality of life… and it was like difficult to live in Eritrea. I have got my sister bigger than me and she is naughty. She didn’t used to go her school and it must have been she missing her lessons. So my mum went to my sister’s school and then they were talking to her teacher. When they were at the school the police came up to my house to take my sister but my sister wasn’t at home… just me and my siblings was at home, and I was the oldest from my siblings.
So the police take me into the police station and then I was stay there for five days, and then my mum came to the police station and she took me from the police station …by a secret about how she did that. I can’t tell you the secret …I promise her…and I hided.
Tell me about your journey to England.
First from Eritrea I escaped to Sudan and then I have been there for a couple of weeks and there were a lot of people. We hadn’t had enough food and water You had to look after ourselves ‘cos no one cannot look after us like our family. And then from Sudan we travelled to Libya and then we were there… like travelling up by Sahara Desert. It was very difficult like we hadn’t had enough food and we hadn’t had water.
There were a lot of young children like 5,6,7 year-old and then it was got very bad. Like there were other people that they tried to look after us, but they couldn’t ‘cos the people who were checking us to deliver, like the drivers they were like racism. If we don’t pay them they were call to our family or other people who can pay money to them. We had to pay. Almost about like $3,000 for each person. You cannot offer-price for it. For some people there… like children… it is too hard for them to pay $3,000.
It is very amount of money, but if they cannot pay to them they will kill us. Most people have been killed ‘cos they hadn’t had enough money to pay to travel to another country. You can’t be a traveller with them if you don’t or if you cannot pay the money. If you cannot pay, or if you cannot call to your family for the money, they were shooting in front of us. That’s the most dangerous bit of our journeys.
Like it was very difficult. You cannot show any person that you care if they shooted another children. You have to hide your tears. If they see you are crying, they just kill you whether you pay or not. They just shoot you with the other people they have shooted. You have to hide all your cares, and you have to wear like you be like their religion. If they find out you praying like Tewahedo way…they just kill you by knife at night..or they just shoot you in front of the other people travellers.”
So how did you get from Libya across to Europe?
I got to Libya and then I got to travel on bus around to a city. They took us into this place and then we had we had to stay there for couple of months as well , ‘cos there were a lot of people in front of us without any food, without any water. Like most of the girls had to… I don’t know it’s hard to describe it …dirty things.
There were a lot of people lying in there, and then from Libya we had to take a small boat. They said we had to stay in boat for a couple of hours.. but it was a whole day to stay in the boat… ‘cos the boat wasn’t good enough to take us to Italy. After we began our journey the engine broke down. We have to stay like, yeah, we were just drifting in the sea. We were scared. Most people think ‘Oh we are going to die’ , or something like that. A lot of panicking ‘cos the boat cannot travel. They told us to “do not move!”, ‘cos if we moved to the side the boat we just turn over and fill up with sea, and we had to stay there for a day and then the big ship come up to us and then they took us into the big ship. And then we had to travel like two days in the big ship, yeah to Italy.
When we are over to Italy the Italy police and …what’s they calls…all the immigration… took us into one place but not all of us. They separated us to different areas and then told to go with different people. I didn’t get to be with my previous people. I go into a different group. I went there and then we don’t know any languages to speak to other people. We found Eritrean people and then we give them our number to call our family people in England.
So you were in Italy by then. And what was the next stage on your journey to Britain?
We give our family phone number to the person, and then he call to our family. He asked them to give money to his friend… or give it to his family member in somewhere, I don’t know where, and then my family had to give money to his family member ‘cos he told him he will take a responsibility for us.
He told us he will put us in safe place and he will take us to different group. We couldn’t communicate with other people that’s why we trust only him. We have to put trust only him and he took us to Calais… and he tried to put us in different cars. And you know, like some cars they just took you to other places and then they just put you down there… and you have to walk up to the area where the big lorries come.
It was hard. Like if you haven’t got enough money to get our food, it’s not our language… even we don’t know any languages from any person. That’s why we cannot ask for anything to help us other than an Eritrean person. ‘cos we cannot communicate with other people, therefore we have to rely on them. But some Eritrean people there they only pretend to be our helper.
He put us in different cars but we haven’t had time to get into Britain then. Unfortunately we tried time again.
It was cold and for food I had to … Wait can I? I can’t….
A pause while Feaven briefly cries …and I sit there feeling useless… offering her a secret plain chocolate Hobnob. Her bright eyes didn’t miss a thing. I told her that my biscuits would be locked away in a different drawer later. If only adults had the resilience of children.
Image: from the ‘art tent’ in Calais with thanks Suzanne Partridge.
Ten No. 6 A packet of chips The sound of The Beat playing ‘Stand down Margaret’ Two on a Fizzy doing fifty! Going down the hill And we’re all lit up On a Castrol night With the two stroke thunder and the gravel rash Grease under your nails That will never come out
SPEEDWAY! Took you speedway every time SPEEDWAY! Tuesday evenings Friday nights
Oh lover I’m still down at the track It’s dark down here and I’m burning up Got my head in a bucket Chewing on a wasp Mad for the crash of your face in my face Down at the track down by the river We got close like skin on gravel And the taste of your mouth That will never wash out
SPEEDWAY ! Kings of the shale the time of our lives! Round and around to the left on a bike SPEEDWAY!
Scunthorpe ScorpionsPoole PiratesExeter FalconsWorkington CometsCanterbury CrusadersHull VikingsOxford CheetahsPlymouth GladiatorsBerwick BanditsIpswich WitchesGlasgow TigersRedcar Bears … and for Pete Lawrence…. Coventry Bees!
A sketch which the wonderful people at R.O.A.R creative workshops in Folkestone and Ashford improved greatly.
He won’t get out ‘Why would he Pin a new address On loneliness?’ Without him We feel empty But he’s lonelier still
“You’re all I have” “Don’t forget about me” “I’m Hungrreeee…” “Feed ME!”
And sometimes he’s quiet And you think you’re winning But he won’t go Or if he does He has the knack Of crawling back Into this house I built With needle spires and poker chips Bottles, pills and betting slips
But here’s the thing If you lay it out Into the light And write Our friend Mr Jones Loses his grip Slinks and slips To the back of your mind Just for a moment, a minute, an hour Not completely for ever… He loves you too much But he prays that it’s fiction Cos the very idea Of eviction Scares him shitless.
With thanks to: Lisa,Doug,Sarah,Lee,John,James,Tony,Andre and Dean at Reach Out And Recover – A Lived Experience Recovery Organisation in Kent. Also RIP the great Jason Molina who’s lyrical concept I plundered shamefully for my lesson plan.
Office girls flirting at the riders By the pelican crossing They do that Vicky’s on the radio Digital radio She’s burning a hole in my shoulder My controller So I stand on the pegs Flick up the nose Make this 250 go sideways Glory bound on the old Kent Road Weaving and jinking Clipping wing mirrors And red means stop Just sometimes Amber means go To me A thousand a week on Greasy Street Talking miles that is not money I got no worries See that fat man die on a slip road while the coppers are pumping his chest Roll a fag Take a rest Then it’s head down and headed for Watford in the rain On a matt black rat bike And all the suburbs look the fucking same The only part of me that is not numb is my eyes Is St Christopher looking out for me from way up there Or is he wringing his hands Tearing his hair out in despair?I’m Triple A like a bullet Triple A dispatchers get home clear three times faster I could just roll on up to the Thames Chuck the whole lot in Stuff a lit rag in the tank and head for home But Vicky’s on the radio Digital radio And she’s burning a hole in my shoulder
Ask him what time it is You’ll see what I mean You’ll learn all about how clocks are made All the stages there have been. From medieval candles Through sundials and Swiss jewels To Caesium atoms decaying in somewhat random fashion
He may just mention the odd dissertation Regarding the possible application Of quantum physics to GPS As a kindness.
You may catch your train…or a less interesting one
