Two men

 

 

The two men of age sat

 

With ice cream cones

 

That melted in the heat;

 

Each drip of luxury

 

Deliberately hung,

 

Heated and scorched,

 

Then scolding coldly

 

On a hand of history

 

August remained constantly pure

 

Blistering memories wide open

 

Their view of horizons widened

 

Across an azure blue-bathed vastness.

 

 

 

Yesterday the cauldron of battle,

 

In vineyards of Toledo

 

Of Catalonia :

 

Of Dust and time and land

 

Precious drops of reddened life

 

Seeped as wine in an

 

Iberian sun;

 

In Spain;

 

To scar an ancient earth.

 

 

 

The two men watched a sunset

 

Caress the shortening day

 

A gilded final stream of fading

 

Light strayed, illuminating

 

Their huddled figures:

 

They looked away.

By Steve Holloway.

The poem relates to the Spanish Civil War. Many ‘ordinary’ men and women from this country (and many other nations too) went to Spain to fight fascism between 1936 – 1939. It is the 75th anniversary of the foundation of the International Brigades in which many perished fighting Franco.

Coastal Bluff

 

Frozen laughter

Slices through salt edged air; 

Squeals of delight echo incongruously,

Weaving amongst deserted chalets.

An ageless orange skyline

Remains subdued as disfigured

Sunshine splinters along

Promenades carpeted with silvery hoar.

Stained faces

Stare seawards, breathing with the tide

And isolated shores confront a

Grey, foaming aggressor:

Seemingly unannounced.

Local with a walking stick:

Standing, sideways,

Huddled beside an arcade,

With a lady who smokes

And a dog that shivers.

The rock emporium is up for sale.

Daylight suffers as a blanket of

Gloom shrouds each stranded folly;

Deep, mournful, marble shadows

Accumulate:

A lone tug-boat exhales.

Songs of summer evaporate

Into a clear, star speckled night.

Pier: Victorian, railing, paint peeling,

Lists just a little more,

Groaning amid the waves.

The Punch and Judy man

Stands alone on the beach:

In silhouette;

With wet feet;

Waiting.

Stephen Holloway

Scarecrow

 

On fenlands of Lincolnshire – alone

 

Flapping against an aggression from the west

 

Borrowed clothes ripping as bellowed sails

 

Flecks of straw rising skywards in dust

 

A rigid form with fluid movement

 

Waving and bending and howling

 

Or is that the squalls of frightened seasons

 

On flatlands

 

On tilled earth

 

Beside the worm worn rook hops

 

Berates the form of tangled frightening

 

Folded scorn, in our clothes

 

Beyond lays a flattened horizon

 

A sun sets in solemn time

 

Lowers with the

 

Arms of the slanted soul who

 

Becomes shade and silhouette

 

Appears in a long view set against

 

A fading light

 

And whistles pitched high

 

Cut through this image of mankind.

 

 

Stephen Holloway.

 Nottingham poet

 

A new York story

 

 

 

The city played Gershwin loud

 

Too much heat, extreme weather

 

Each avenue appeared to glue together

 

High summer bewildered the crowd

 

 

 

Eddie Silver sat, foot upon his knee

 

Business on hold; for lunch – pastrami,

 

Onions and relish, on rye

 

A reflective time for the private eye

 

 

 

In breezed the dame – buxom and jilted

 

Stood by the window to sensually smoulder

 

Eddie looked up from a trilby that tilted

 

Out to the mean streets, over her shoulder

 

 

 

Looking at her weeping, an unsteady broad

 

Beautiful brunette from the south-side of town

 

A letter thrown open, words tumbled down

 

Gershwin played on – in a far lower chord

 

 

 

Eddie stared through her dark damson eyes

 

To the reason she stood close to him

 

Softly speaking of hardship and lies

 

Trying to unburden the notion of sin

 

 

 

Eddie Silver: private investigator

 

Discretion totally guaranteed

 

Every diploma from murder to law

 

All cases taken – religion and creed

 

 

 

The sun beat down on Times Square

 

Yellow cabs swerved in tandem to

 

The beat of the people who share

 

The sound of a rhapsody in blue.

 

 

Stephen Holloway.

Social mobility

 

 

I bought her a scooter

She thought it would suit her

I spoke to her suitor

He told me to shoot her

 

I purchased a shooter

He said ‘would I shoot her’?

I’d much sooner sue her

Than shoot and then slew her

 

I sold on the scooter

To Stu her lame suitor

And what of the shooter?

Inside of my shoe sir.

 

Violence and shooters

Old age and scooters

Suture

Future.

 

 

Stephen Holloway

 

• What can I say – what about sorry?  It makes me laugh out loud and I wrote it!

Seriously though – there is a message in there somewhere.

Past midnight

Shadowy thin man appears

lurking amid car headlights,

he’s obviously had a few beers,

it’s not a pretty sight

a man who sheds tears.

The sky cloaked as a funeral,

held in a dull trance,

has an uneasy reliance

on misplaced Novas; innumerable,

shooting to a macabre dance.

Thin man follows his own star,

Trilby hat over one eye

to some bolted door of a saloon bar,

again he begins to cry,

too late, I fear, for that last jar.

Crescent moon on high illuminates

empty streets, shuttered blinds,

closed doors, sleeping minds,

dreaming of last nights date,

waking suddenly to ruminate.

Only the thin man walks the way

of hopes and stars and dreams,

unsteadily unable to convey,

nor neither equipped to delay,

a morning mist on sunlit streams.

By Stephen Holloway

Song

  

 

It made me look and stop awhile

 

This song from bellowed breast

 

On high, on branch, a feathered one

 

Without a spring-time nest

 

 

 

Low winter sun escaped the clouds

 

And stroked the preening bird

 

Deep traffic flowed below the elm

 

But still the song was heard

 

 

 

The songbird sang for all things new

 

A voice of fledgling hope

 

Dancing from each ancient branch

 

In fine plumage of bespoke

 

 

 

I took my leave as day departed

 

A song took flight from where it started.

Stephen Hollaway

RAIN

Sheltering in a doorway from

Diagonal machine-gun rain

Bullets that riddled the church;

Hallowed windows remained stained.

A man, revered, spoke of community

Spirit, occasionally in a Latin tongue

I listened via an agnostic ear

Who was I to say he was wrong?

Sitting at the back drying out

With people who queued for wine

And solace, much more else:

Seeking words from that divine.

As wine turned back to holy water

The heavens opened up

I walked amongst the gathered people

And drank from cherished cup.

STEPHEN HOLLOWAY

 

Flag (Lament)

 

 

 

 

Next summer no sign of a flag

 

What a drag

 

No fluttering cross from a car

 

Empty bars

 

 

 

George defeated by a Croat dragon

 

Our heart is saddened

 

Goliath, tamed from Zagreb, is found

 

Weeping, wounded, and unsound

 

 

 

High expectations slowly unfrocked

 

Defence unlocked

 

Defiantly waving banners with desperation

 

It’s over; only respiration

 

 

 

Red merges white – we surrender

 

1966: remember

 

Faded flags of former glories

 

That brings old men’s’ stories

 

 

 

Muffled voices, startled looks

 

For disbelief and flights of rooks

 

Darken the sky; amid the land –

 

The flag, bemused, dare not stand

 

 

 

So console your symbol of power

 

Walk away to that ivory tower

 

Give it a rest for a while

 

As Europe wryly smiles.

 

 

 

• My anti-jingoism poem that tries to lower the flag a little.  Many feel the Union Jack and cross of St. George has been somewhat ‘hijacked’ by factions of the far right.  ‘Faded flags of former glories’ has a double meaning really – football (England were beaten by Croatia in a group qualifying game in 2007) and empire.  We are a spent force in both of these areas, but many still feel we are a world power; in both football and as a military force: we are neither.

 

VOTE FOR THIS

10th competition

Hood (The Outlaw Rap)

You see this – it’s misunderstood

 

Man it’s just a hood

 

A big part of my attire

 

But it’s starting to conspire

 

Against me and my generation

 

Next there’ll be legislation

 

By the men in the suits

 

Westminster brutes!

 

I mean check out their gear

 

That’s the look of fear

 

We don’t make no wars

 

Give me girls and dance floors

 

So I can live as a young man

 

Without a plan

 

In an existence of leisure

 

Of unadulterated pleasure

 

Sometimes in excess

 

Often reckless

 

But no threat to national security

 

At my tender age only purity

 

And respect is good enough

 

But what about love?

 

Is there any left?

 

Must I be bereft

 

Of mutual understanding

 

With our elders demanding

 

We keep in line

 

So you see my decline

 

Will make me retreat to my disguise:

 

Behind propaganda and lies.

Stephen Holloway

 

March Hare

 

 

 

And she spotted the blur at once.

 

Standing stock still

 

the spaniel took a stance

 

of anticipation.

 

 

 

One single solitary hare

 

jinked and swerved to the

 

tune of a month’s madness;

 

I attempted to restrain the

 

anxious beast but

 

she was gone, too strong;

 

a gundog unleashed,

 

Instincts released,

 

quarry insight,

 

on comes the night.

 

 

 

Two shadows:

 

weaving amongst grasslands,

 

the hare all speed,

 

the spaniel all duty;

 

I view the spectacle

 

with admiration;

 

beauty and nature

 

as one;

 

as hundreds of years ago.

 

 

 

The spaniel stops in disgust,

 

snorting rapidly;

 

the hare turns, I’m

 

sure he laughs,

 

and takes a bow:

 

the spaniel and I depart:

 

silhouettes showered by moon dust.

 

 Stepthen  Holloway

 

“MY FAVOURITE POEM”

On the Ning Nang Nong 

 

On the Ning Nang Nong 
Where the Cows go Bong! 
and the monkeys all say BOO! 
There’s a Nong Nang Ning 
Where the trees go Ping! 
And the tea pots jibber jabber joo. 
On the Nong Ning Nang 
All the mice go Clang 
And you just can’t catch ’em when they do! 
So its Ning Nang Nong 
Cows go Bong! 
Nong Nang Ning 
Trees go ping 
Nong Ning Nang 
The mice go Clang 
What a noisy place to belong 
is the Ning Nang Ning Nang Nong!! 

BY

Spike Milligan

SEND IN ONE OF YOUR  FAVOURITE POEMS

VOTED KIDS BEST POEM 

SENT IN BY THOMAS SIMS

 

“Sea-Fever”

I must down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky,

And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by,
And the wheel’s kick and the wind’s song and the white sail’s shaking,
And a grey mist on the sea’s face, and a grey dawn breaking.I must down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide
Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied;
And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying,
And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the sea-gulls crying.I must down to the seas again, to the vagrant gypsy life,
To the gull’s way and the whale’s way where the wind’s like a whetted knife;
And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover
And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick’s over.By John Masefield (1878-1967).
(English Poet Laureate, 1930-1967.)

Wonderful poem.

 

Sent in by Stephen Holloway.

Days

 

What are days for?

Days are where we live.

They come, they wake us

Time and time over.

They are to be happy in:

Where can we live but days?

 

Ah, solving that question

Brings the priest and the doctor

In their long coats

Running over the fields.

 

Philip Larkin

1922–1985

I have always enjoyed Philip Larkin; he writes about the smallness of life and the larger events that affect us all.

 

Stephen Holloway.

What’s your favourite poem?

A Glimpse

When silence has flooded the house

 

tin soldiers open their eyes

 

clockwork feet of a tiny mouse

 

attempting to surprise

 

a spaniel deep in dreams

 

of some endless summer field

 

of lake and starlit streams

 

no longer forced to heel

 

 

 

One long yawn slowly began

 

a twitch of a shiny nose

 

and a growl at a figure like Pan

 

a bark that would surely impose

 

in darkness, by fireside, a white beard,

 

that gleamed as if part of a crown

 

the dog and tin soldiers n’er feared

 

the figure in the red velvet gown.

Stephen Holloway

9th competition

Fire and Steam

Grinding metal

Hissing steam

Stained black faces

Bodies lean

Wheels that ran on

Rusting dreams

Through an age

When money preened

Look inside the flame

Of progress

Heat of revolution

Noticed

Coated with a sheen

Of labour

Coal thrown through

Then all is vapour

Vanishing era that shrank

By Beeching

Consigned to history

Assigned for teaching

Out of the gloom

She snorted once more;

Into a vortex we assume:

Fireball finds the trapdoor.

By Stephen Holloway

9th competition

Stage Fright

Into unlit recesses stalks doubt

Befriending demons that contort

Shadows and inhabit the empty space

Of elevated madness

Peer through a flat darkness which engulfs

The soul

Silent shrieking sudden echo

Strangling thought and speech

Amid an angled nightmare

Tunnelled

Sensing the rush of reversed air

Painted in hues of panicked sweat

One small creak of board

Housed in stillness

Flickering: one scarlet subdued gaslight

A cough

And rustle of curtain.

By Stephen Holloway

 

Exits and Entrances

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Autumn stood at the crossroads

 

Wearing a golden coat of plenty

 

Giving a last look at the year

 

Surrounded by a shallow mist

 

A russet door stood ajar

 

Then burst off its hinges

 

Remnants of leaves took flight

 

Autumn’s residue trampled by

 

A darkling thug

 

A braggart and thief made

 

Its entrance

 

Faceless and hooded

 

Breathing frosted air

 

Hands of cold compressed steel

 

That held the dying autumn

 

By the throat

 

This mellow boy gasped

 

His November smile slid

 

Into the deadly snarl of

 

December

 

Dark shortened days of

 

December

 

Winter stood with autumn

 

In his arms

 

Hues of faded reds and

 

Tainted greens bled slowly

 

From the fallen season.

 

 

Stephen Holloway.

 

 

 

 

• I like to walk and notice the change in seasons.  Using human form to depict the autumn and winter gave me some scope to see them as the frail disappearing season of beautiful hues, and the brash, bullying season of darkness and chill – making a terrifying entrance.

 

 

 

 

Sheila

 

 

 

 

In the bar she sat alone

 

Just with her mobile phone

 

She sipped on her happy hour beer

 

And showed signs of fear

 

That he’d let her down again

 

The beer glass began to stain

 

In rings on the wobbling table

 

She stood, unable

 

To move or speak with clarity

 

Life was without hilarity.

 

 

Stephen Holloway.

Apprentice

An old ancient trade

To a new bag of tools

Skilled master craftsmen

With patience and guile

Show a young eager boy

How it’s all done, what not to do

Keen to learn, willing to graft

For in return, a gift, a craft

To use throughout life

This education of art

Taught to a boy, used as a man

Three years of indenture

In theory and practise

By brain and brawn

Viewed through the telescope of life

A journey that starts as a boy

With a new bag of tools

To a man with an old ancient trade.

Stephen Holloway

9th competition 2011