Cobo Sea-Wall - Richard Fleming

The granite sea-wall holds the heat
accumulated through the day
so, side by side, we take a seat
to watch sun set on Cobo Bay.
The taste of fresh-fried fish and chips
is salty when I kiss your lips.

There on the beach, late walkers shift
like friendly ghosts, as down the sun
slips like a red balloon adrift.
Day’s end: yet for us, just begun,
a summer romance, foolish hearts
that quicken when the sun departs.

Richard Fleming

Snowy Tops - Diane Scantlebury

We people with our snowy tops
Androgynous in dress,
We hunt in pairs,
We grunt and grumble
About today’s youth,
Refuse to disguise or dye
Our snowy white hair,

We people with our snowy tops
We’ve had our time,
We’ve had the best,
Released the equity from our homes
Smug and secure,
We’ve feathered our nests,

We people with our snowy tops
We go on cruises,
We trawl the world,
Draw our pensions as we relax
On sunnier shores,
While the youth we berate
Grow unhealthy and poor,

We people with our snowy tops
We’ve had our fun,
Drained the world’s resources
Until there’s almost none,
We’ve climbed up our ladders
And behind us shut the door,
Lapped up all the cream
Now there’s no more.

Diane Scantlebury

The Crown's Jewel - Donald Keyman

Sarnia Cherie drowns in a shining plastic sea
A sinking seafront of supermarket hegemony
The once glittering jewel tarnished by trade
A place where coffees and sandwiches are made

Burdened by laws that no one will enforce
These are the days of cart before horse
The rubbish piles high on old Guernsey streets
And cannot be cleared by stickers and tweets

The Government lives in its navel-gazing bubble
Waiting for the latest code of conduct squabble
But the vultures are waiting, out in the wings
They’re tired of dealing with Brexity things

They're coming for us, old Mitchell and Hodge
Hell-bent on delivering their constitutional fudge
So now it’s time to save old Sarnia Cherie
To polish and harden the gem of the sea

Donald Keyman

The Cycle - Ian Duquemin

You shoot at them…
They'll shoot right back
And through your cowardly attack
Many more will surely die
Their families left to mourn and cry
So in revenge you kill some more
To try and even out the score
This cycle now a constant threat
But when you hate, that's what you get!
If murder, maiming, fills your heart
This cycle then, is just the start
You shoot at them…
They shoot right back
And through your terrorist attack
Many more will wrongly die
Their loved ones left to reason… Why?
And so the cycle keeps on turning
Hunger for revenge now yearning
Shoot the people… Burn the mosque
With no concern of life that's lost
The cycle turns just like before
You hate them, but they hate you more
And on and on and on it goes
This hatred only ever grows
So…
You shoot at them…
They shoot right back
And through the threat of your attack
This cycle just rotates again
Causing untold death and pain
I wonder… Will this ever cease?
Could different faiths just pray for peace?
And glory in the freedom found
To stop this cycle turning round

Ian Duquemin

Evolve To A Higher Plane - Kathy Figueroa

This poem was inspired by world events on March 14th, 2019.

There’s so much bad news
It’s like the world’s going to Hell
Will mankind survive?
These days, it’s hard to tell

A mass shooting in a mosque
Down in kiwi land
Another senseless slaughter
Sane folks don’t understand

Divisions in religion
Politics, and race
Become like ugly team sports
This society’s disgrace

Some are on Team Christian
Others on Team Jew
There’s Team Moslem, Team Sikh
Team Hindu, to name just a few

Will humans ever get along
And evolve to a higher plane?
Or are we doomed to destruction
By the hateful and insane?

Kathy Figueroa

The Men in the Masks: Pt1 - Callum Lee Doherty

Say not as thou dost, but through clocks as we rot
and thy shine dare not speak as before.
Pray, what divine cost, whispers, gods have we lost;
should my time and my steeple endure?
What price did He ask of you? What silence they grasp from us all.
We regress to impress; dictions learned, fictions spread,
Crystal spurned in pursuit of the chore.

Wear(e), take me; here, lately,
Enslaved of my bastard rapport.
De-grade me; dear, break me,
For we’ve lost in this faintest of cause.
I’m consumed by that thing I abhorred; I’m consumed by the virus in thoughts.

His mask see not mine, told my stifling mind,
As the roses – redolent – entwined.
And we all sing and dance, lest we might get a glance
of the frozen – exposure – we’re blind.

Déjà entendu, elate and offend you
Rehearsed since thy birth and refined.
But when all set aside, through thine time’s genocide
Hollows corpses – thoughtless – confined.

I will not reach out to your hand; and I swear I ne’er called on your name.
My design can divide and abort you; but my solace – I lied – I’m afraid.

Callum Lee Doherty

Ghosts - Tony Gardner

They played the concert in the Parish church
And walls resounded with the songs they sung
And while the music moved, affected all
I felt the ghosts who mingled there among
The listeners young and old, and those whose kin
Have lived here oh, so many hundred years
The incomers who may or likely not may not stay
So if they go will not cause many tears

I stand at my great-great-grandfather's grave
And feel him near while walking fields he trod
I wonder how rich folk think they can own
Land owned not by their money but by God.

Tony Gardner

The Winter Jumper - V. Bean

My special job is to warm up somebody
they sometimes pull me, often stretch me
I swing on the line, at clothes-hanging time
and if it starts to rain, they come and fetch me.

I don’t like getting wet, I want to hide
my favourite spot, the tumble dryer
so snug and warm, when I’m inside
I love it when they turn it higher.

After I’m worn for a while, it’s a woolen-wash
then pegged up, to hang, dodging snow and rain
food gets spilt on me, they really don’t care
and stink! . . it’s that awful perfume, again.

Ooh, look, I’m in for a quick-wash
now I’m hanging out, in a Winter moon
I never really feel the cold of night
‘cos I’m a three-ply, cable-knit cocoon.

I await my owner’s comfy hands,
to unpeg me, carefully fold me, then
back in my big drawer, to rest, until
they decide to put me on, again.

I’m back on the line again, soon
but not next to the knickers and bras
they all seem to go together
but, me, I’m only Granpa’s.

V. Bean

Companion - Ian Duquemin

I ran into the devil
Who was just, hanging around
He needed a little sunshine
It was me the devil found
He asked me “Where you going?”
I replied I didn't know
“But if you wanna walk with me
Just follow where I go”
We walked across the meadows
Many rivers we would cross
The sun above had brightened
And it slowly followed us
We reached a mountain where I said
“We'll climb this mountain high”
The devil he just laughed and said
“I haven't wings to fly”
With distant steps behind me
My new friend stopped to say
“I can't go any further, as I've kinda lost my way”
I gave my friend a smile. Took another step or two
Then turned to him and said “Oh well… I guess I'll follow you”

Ian Duquemin