Tunnel Vision

(A view on the Calais malaise).


From an oppressive barren heat
into our unseasonal northern chill
they blindly come, filthy
on their camino of avarice
to scurry around Coquelles,
gnawing, ripping, squabbling
at the flimsy token barrier,
easily breached
their thin eyes desperate, cold
play a tormenting game
each night, a joyless lotto
high stakes, win big, what chance?



© Graham Sherwood 07/2015

Bea and the Badger

(Granddaughter love).


A badger broke from cover
in Pitcher Lane at 7.03
I don’t know who was more surprised
Bea or me or he?

Unbothered he damply sniffed the breeze
still wet with morning’s shower
then nonchalantly glanced at us
before trundling through a bower.

Bea looked at me, and then the tree
and back to me once more,
at eighteen months with what she’d seen
she wasn’t really sure.


© Graham Sherwood 07/2015

The girls 3/50

They pass
always in twos, arm in arm
in tight-knit jumpers, long,
hiding short skirts, black tights
stalking like liquorice sticks,
bird’s nests bouffants, backcombed
straggled fringes
to hide the Dusty Springfield eyes,
looking but not looking
at the boys,
it’s always the taller one they want.

Later they'll give the boys a treat,
sitting primly on the damp grass
in the rec,
a glimpse of knickers,
their secret is to look bored
listening to a tiny transistor,
sweets for my sweet
sugar for my honey
no fags until Friday
unless the boys offer
and want what in return.


© Graham Sherwood 07/2015

Prom Queen

Tonight I will be beautiful too,
In the shrieking frenzy
amongst the loveliest girls
my pretty friends,
drowning in their self-obsession,
tonight
a one time only friendship,
the first time
they will see my face
without the niqab
with a feint smile
I will be noticed
at last
I have the dress,
the hair,
the shoes,
the bag,
the eyes
the bomb





© Graham Sherwood 07/2015

The boys 2/50

Cross-legged at the crossroads
on peeling green council benches,
where the elderly often stare with wet eyes,
young boys , blowing grass between their thumbs
peer into the distance
to glimpse their futures
and their forbidden fruits
delivered by road.

They dream of music stardom,
fucking the older village girls,
earning money and shiny motorbikes.
One or two, the handsome ones,
have had a feel behind the Working Mens’
small soft warm breasts
bartered for a brittle kitkat
from the cold milk machine
outside the chipshop,
knees remain together,
strictly top deck only.

Some will venture, others stay
snagged in the net
the stew pond of regret and despondency
with local wives, made into fat mothers
blinkered by a cold sex present
and a warm beer future
skittles and an angry dog.



© Graham Sherwood 07/2015

Eremos

In a hole, concealed, inwardly satiated
one eye panning, then acutely fixed
on easy prey, parading before
his fang-like claws,
and bullying mandibles that rip and tear
pull and jag,
bruise and cut
just enough to mark then,
as if cowardly,
a slow but cautious reverse,
perhaps ashamed, remorseful
of this frightening violation



© Graham Sherwood 07/2015

The place 1/50

Two roads cross at an ancient obelisk,
crumbling red stones,
anonymous tomb or local myth,
thoughts of a highwayman’s fancy.

Down the older-end, of similar build,
cottages, moneyed folk, incomers, posher
than the new top shop post-war boxes,
thrown up quick,
young families in new shoes, with old tongues
clickers, pullovers, finishers
tacks in teeth and the reek of leather pong.

But there is disease here,
an ambivalent melancholia
“a watch it die and then moan” malady,
virulent, as each factory wizens, and folds
blown into the wet gutter
with the daily mirror chip paper.


© Graham Sherwood 07/2015

Koan on knowledge

To answer the questions of life
a man must first allow the question
or how can he know anything
of life


© Graham Sherwood 07/2015

A theism

must faith be blind?
for
faith cowers under fear,
and
reward requires one's faith
so
ignorance is faith itself
but
martyred faith is celebrated
when
faith pulls a trigger
on
those of little faith
how
can this faith endure



© Graham Sherwood 06/2015

Class of 2015

There was a distant time of yore
when rich meant fat and thin meant poor
but that doesn't figure anymore
The fat wear sports clothes every day
but this doesn't keep the lbs at bay
it's not our fault they always say

The thin are wealthiest now I guess
live on rocket and watercress
nothing more and nothing less
The poor seem resigned to benefits
buy huge tv's, get tatts on tits
and pitbulls rip their kids to bits

The rich stay smug behind strong gates
but moan about poor savings rates
posh pensioners all in dire straits
So life’s not always what it seems
fat, thin, rich, poor we all have dreams
but suffer from insomnia it seems



© Graham Sherwood 06/2015