Poetry

It goes on one at a time,
it starts when you care to act,
it starts when you do it again after they said no,
it starts when you say we and know who you mean,
and each day you mean one more.

Marge Piercy

Wednesday, 22 February 2017 10:31

The Heels of Can-Can Dancers Kicking Towards the Stars

Written by Fred Voss

in Poetry

The Heels of Can-Can Dancers Kicking Towards the Stars by Fred Voss A poem is a reason to get up in the morningthe crownsof 100 Sequoia redwood trees soaking in the suntogether a cupof ice water in the middle of the Sahara desert a poembounces across a midnight alley like…

Sunday, 19 February 2017 19:09

Pick up a pen and speak out

Written by Matt Abbott

in Poetry

It was a couple of weeks after my 18th birthday, and I was on the coach back from a political rally in London. It was either anti-cuts or anti-war, I’m not entirely sure, but safe to say it attracted those of us on the left of the political spectrum. On…

Saturday, 21 January 2017 16:32

I belong

Written by Sheree Mack

in Poetry

white privileges upon a turquoise thresholdI hold on to you tightersensing shifts I stroke these momentsof damaged velvet withdesperate need hearing you breatheno longer I and youno longer black and white I wish I could seewith your eyeswalk with your privileges I swallow my wordslike glass become tangledin sheets of…

K2_PUBLISHED_ON Wednesday, 18 January 2017 09:39

A Coverlet of Green: In Memoriam John Berger

in Poetry

Written by David Betteridge

A COVERLETOF GREEN by David Betteridge The bare and barren treecan be made green again...- Antonio Gramsci ¶ A boy cried.His bedside cup,brimful with milkbefore he slept, was emptynow, at morning-time.Not one drop he'd drunk.How, then, no milk? The culprit mouse,her creamy lips a give-away,felt sorry for the boy.And still…

John Berger Antonio Gramsci Hamish Henderson

K2_PUBLISHED_ON Monday, 16 January 2017 16:17

Like Mother

in Poetry

Written by Nadia Drews

Like Mother by Nadia Drews Settle down, bottom set, poor concentration, what do you expect?Failed tests, predictable results, staying behindred linesLife viewed through windows in the sticks ,drizzling with tears of spilling pissClinging like dribble to chins of grizzling kids, you didn’t do what the other girls didTossed like crossings…

K2_PUBLISHED_ON Monday, 14 November 2016 17:19

I am pleased to congratulate Mr. Trump

in Poetry

Written by Kevin Higgins

I Am Pleased To Congratulate On Behalf Of The People Of Irelandafter Enda Kenny by Kevin Higgins Donald J. Duck on his election as forty fifth, and possibly final,President of that great entity traditionally known as the UnitedStates which, admittedly,by the time he’s finished with it,will likely be called something…

K2_PUBLISHED_ON Monday, 14 November 2016 08:43

Sure

in Poetry

Written by Fred Voss

Sure by Fred Voss It is the morning after Donald Trump was elected president of the United States and I am at my machine and I grip my machine’s handlewith my palmthe steel handle is still solid and hardagainst my soft flesha racist hate-filled egomaniac dictatorial sexual predator swindler infant…

Fred Voss Trump

Friday, 04 November 2016 15:36

'Work For It!' John Berger at 90

Written by Mike Quille

in Poetry

John Berger was born on 5th November 1926. To celebrate his 90th birthday, we republish some of his poems, an interview, and some of his quotations. One of the people who was due to attend the Teeside International Poetry Festival in 2015 was John Berger, the Marxist art critic, essayist,…

John Berger Teeside International Poetry Festival

Wednesday, 02 November 2016 15:33

as if they are normal folk

Written by Jane Burn

in Poetry

as if they are normal folk by Jane Burn Shops. Imagine them wanting shops. Wanting to buy stuff as if they are normal folk. Wanting to be just like us, with our popping out for bread and milk, fags, sweets, bsicuits, pop. Whatever. Imagine them needing food like that. Libraries. …

Tuesday, 01 November 2016 15:28

Poets Exploding Like Bombs: poems from the Spanish Civil War

Written by Mike Quille

in Poetry

To mark the 80th anniversary of the start of the Spanish Civil War, and in memory of the British and Irish International Brigaders who wrote poems and who died in that war, Mike Quille introduces a few poems taken from Poems from Spain, edited by Jim Jump. The war against…

Sunday, 16 October 2016 14:56

It Ain't Me, Bob

Written by Heathcote Williams

in Poetry

Heathcote Williams suggests that the latest recipient of the Nobel prize for literature is guilty of cultural identity theft. A then unknown and insecure folk singer looking to forge an identity for himself latched onto Dylan’s name and by assuming it, Robert Allen Zimmerman saw a way of securing for himself…