Knaphill Poetry Week

Knaphill Poetry Week 06-12 June 2010

Pond No.3 at the Country Park, Knaphill

The Knaphillian is pleased to host this year's event and we look forward to receiving some fine work by contributors. Last year's event received some great exposure in the local press and feedback from our authors and readers alike has been very encouraging.

Poems can be on any subject and must not exceed 40 lines and must be the author's own work. You can submit up to six poems. The poetry week is open to all, so if you do live outside of Knaphill you are still welcome to submit your work.

We will also be publishing an e-anthology which will be available by FREE download via this site. The book will contain the best poems submitted to us from 2009 & 2010

It's still not too late to send in your poems for inclusion theknaphillian@yahoo.com

Knaphill Poetry Week : Elizabeth Arrow, Gary Fellows, *Mal Foster, Helena Harper, Paul Martin, and A.P. Whittick

*Mal Foster is our Poet in Residence - www.malfoster.co.uk

Knaphill Voices

"We believe poetry is all about creating a reaction and if we can do that, then we’ll know that all our efforts have been worthwhile" - Mal Foster

Click Here To View & Download Poems by Local Authors

Woking Review article on last year's Knaphill Poetry Week

Daily Poems by Guest Poets

These poems originally appeared in WIRE Poetry Magazine and The Spice-Box which were published from Knaphill. We are pleased to announce that an e-version of WIRE is set to be relaunched by new editor Kathy Kelso later this year.

ORANGE by Alison Brumfitt

Fat space hoppers with huge spring stomachs

Damaging synthetic food colouring.

Workmen in shiny orange anoraks.

The hazy sun as it sits in the sky,

oozing juice like a fruit ripe for harvest.

Sandy kittens, ginger biscuits, pumpkins.

Autumn leaves like a carpet in a forest.

Mottled light patterns of burning embers.

The agile flicker of a candle flame.

Goldfish, koi carp, carrots and tangerines

Piss, puke, tea and coffee stains.

The smoker’s smile with his nicotine grin,

The colour of the kidney patient’s skin

who like the autumn leaves is swiftly dying.

POSTCARD HOME by Philip Woodrow

Last night I wanted to forget

The outback half a world away

With just a postcard home to say:

I’m alright here; my mind is set.

Pretending I’ve come home, I know

That exile is not what we fear;

My ancestors had once lived here

In peace, a century ago.

But somehow something more

Than postcards of the place we live;

I can’t forget and won’t forgive

The silence that I should ignore.

ASYLUM ANGELS by Dee Rimbaud

There are angels in his head:

They dance in dreams of sleep

Through viscous rusted cloud,

Thick as moon blood, slow

As the entwined hands

Of a forgotten plaster god.

They waltz in the dying wind,

An ephemeral whisper

Caressing the numb lobes

Of his temptingly open ears.

And they are beautiful

In the untouchable light:

Their flesh, blue as ether, cold

As the jagged rainbow’s edge.

They lower his broken soul

Down into the netherworld

Beyond the cloying reach

Of clinical white hands,

Through strands of perfected madness

The barbiturates cannot touch.

THE NEW FLATMATE by Amanda Eason

You’re learning his language

A word a day, you say – smiling.

Fresh-baked cookies in the cake tin.

Though, personally, you’re off your food.

A national dish, you explain.

The house – clean as a new pin,

hasn’t been smooched over by the Hoover

with such vigour in a long time.

Fruit in the fruit bowl.

New candles ready to light.

Your sudden interest in the oppressed peoples

of the world surprises your friends,

you say: This will not last.

The Return by Barbara Ellis

See these old photos;

The sepia tones a little faded.

They have lain, year upon year,

Discarded in desk or drawer

Waiting to release memory.

Let me smooth the creases,

Look! Do you remember?

Here, striding, wide mouth and confident

Eyes laughing; you look so young, invincible,

a bulwark shielding the fearful child who peers

From behind your skirts

Your strong hand grasps her hand;

As mine must now hold yours

Guiding you through the unfamiliar rooms

Of your own house.

You, who are now so frail,

Look at me like the child in the photograph

Wanting to know how to behave.

You have already returned somewhere

Beyond that frozen moment,

Unconscious of my pain

Knowing I never can be your child again.

AT STONEHENGE by Deirdre Armes Smith

Behind the wire fence

the massive stones

are caged like beasts –

too powerful for freedom.

The evening sky

flows in an opal sea

above the endless sweep

of Salisbury Plain

flooding my mind

with echoes from the past…

I try to catch that time

when these gaunt presences

predicted phases of the moon

but it is out of reach.

Prehistory is too far away.

Only the sacrificial Tess

lies crouched on that cold slab.

Imagined woman, you are more real to me

than any stone age man.

BLACK SUNDAY by John Binns

Cockatoos and matchstick men,

I feel as if I’m down again,

Its difficult to be quite sure

But I don’t know what I am living for.

Black Sunday hit me between the eyes

And my uncertainty was some surprise.

I fell asleep and hit the sack,

Woke up with a monkey on my back

Which persisted till I went to bed

And now my doldrums are well fed,

For perhaps I’m only hungry now

For eating seems to show me how

An apple a day can end my plight,

I listened to the music in the night

But top hits began to pall

When you’ve already heard them all.