<strong>Issue</strong> <strong>42</strong>_riskuk_jan16 04/04/2018 17:53 Page 34 | 34 www.sandbagtimes.co.uk
<strong>Issue</strong> <strong>42</strong>_riskuk_jan16 04/04/2018 17:56 Page 35 Poetry Corner EARLY DOORS This was when to catch him in good spirits before the mid-evening rush and jostle, before the calling for another bottle, another pint, with hardly time to fill it. <strong>No</strong>w he had the time to pass the time of day. While the unwatched clock cut him some slack he smoked, talked and joked as he topped up black patient porter. Liffey water, some would say. Don knew better, ignored their ignorance of the Wicklow mountain source. What is true doesn’t always go down well. Circumstance dictates that knowledge benefits the few. He set his clock – ten minutes ahead. Dead on eleven he’d call time. Enough said. Introducing Michael Woods Michael Woods has two poetry collections published by Templar Poetry: Absence <strong>No</strong>tes and Algebra. His next, Opening Time, will be launched in September 2018 at <strong>The</strong> Lamb and Flag in Worcester and uses the sonnet form throughout. Three of these appear here. POETRY CORNER Books available here: www.michaeljwoods.me.uk Instagram: michaelwoods_poet CELLAR All is ordered, ship-shape and clinical down here – smacks something of Guernsey’s German underground hospital. We’re learning an unexpected lesson. Rabbinical, Garry shows us how to reach the pinnacle of cellar care, knows when to turn on taps that mix the gas, can tell with just a slap how much is in a barrel: finical. Draymen drop depth-charge beer kegs through the hatch; they hit the crash mat with a dead-weight thud but don’t explode. Imagination’s match is lit - this vault blows up and starts to flood, becomes the Kursk with no-one left alive; all this stricken sub can do is dive, dive, dive. SEISIÚN – I Ollie Roche is in his early seat, session leader every Monday night. Settled on the green bench-end he sips a pint of bitter, anticipates the craic - the beat and banter of the lads, who now he greets as they arrive, tune up, sit in, on song: Mark, Ally, Helen, Rupert, Beth and John. Suddenly, the unspoken makes complete sense as conversation turns to music - magically, magisterially in the alembic of charged air. <strong>The</strong> ludic night plays on, out – immaterially able through what’s transmuted and past change to sing its own condition, find its range. OPTICS On my left, Adrian, salmon bandit and bookies’ favourite. On my right, Steve - red-braced (Bunter), belted FTSE pundit: both about to do what no one would believe. In those days Don sold Packet Ploughman’s Lunch, a snack of crackers, silverskins and cheese. Well, Adrian often bought a stack of these to share with Steve, and that day said to him mid-munch: Will you have a Powers with me? Gravitation was defied by optics. Two bottles later, unbroken, in words that signalled faith in levitation, Newton’s laws reduced there to mere token, straight-faced, drunk, Adrian turned to drink Steve’s health: Would you like to join me? <strong>The</strong> top shelf? Win This Fantastic Title This unusual and beautiful book collects together twenty five of the often read, wellloved poets. Each poet is illustrated with an original watercolor portrait by the talented young artist, Charlotte Zeepvat, who reproduces in pleasing script one of their works, giving a biographical summary that placed the poet firmly in the battlefield context in which their work was conceived. To have a chance at winning this fabulous book, simply email your poetry to: jane@sandbagtimes.com www.sandbagtimes.co.uk 35 |