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CAUGHT IN THE NET 187 - POETRY BY PAUL WARING
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|
some
part of me still knows. Bunched lavender
breaths from white enamel jug, a window-ledge
in a front room lit by laughter that disappears
like in Bergman films
the moment a door opens
and sisters and brothers I never had unlock me
lid by lid
to wander
from cotton-clutched sleep.
from Mother Tongue by Paul Waring |
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CONTENTS
1 - BIOGRAPHY
2 – POETRY
ON BEDSITS
MOTHER TONGUE
SHEDBOUND
THE LADY NEXT DOOR IS LOST
NEIGHBOURHOOD WATCH
THE SUMMER IN QUESTION
OTHERWORLDS
MAN ON A TRAIN
UNFINISHED
MELT |
3 - PUBLISHING HISTORY
4 - AFTERWORD
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1 – BIOGRAPHY: Paul Waring
Paul
Waring is from Wirral, UK. His
poems have been widely published in themed anthologies,
print
journals,
magazines
and webzines.
A 2017 Pushcart Prize nominee, he
was awarded second place in the 2019 Yaffle Prize and commended and short-listed
in the 2019 Welshpool Poetry Competition.
Recent
and forthcoming publications include: Prole, Atrium,
Ink Sweat & Tears, London Grip, The Blue Nib,
Dear Reader,
Nine Muses Poetry, Dodging The Rain (Ireland),
Beautiful Dragons ‘Well, Dam’ anthology, Yaffle Press
‘An Insubstantial Universe’ anthology and
Half-Moon Books ‘A View From Olympia’ anthology. His debut pamphlet,
Quotidian,
was
published
in 2019
by
Yaffle Press.
Paul
is a part of the
Wirral Poetry Festival
planning team. He enjoys
performing
poetry and has
been
guest poet at a number of
poetry
events around the UK.
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2 - POETRY
ON BEDSITS
Three
flights up
threadbare arthritic stairs
in damp stale air
a vase-less jumble
of nicotined furniture
sepia-tinted peeling walls
and clogged lungs of carpet.
Ill-fitting dentures
of sash windows rattle
as shivering lips
of curtain beg
warmth
from a
one-bar electric fire
that eats fifty pence pieces.
Cracked elbows of PVC
sofa
sprout corn-coloured foam
tangerine acrylic of seats
singed and stained by careless
ciggies and TV dinners.
On
a stripped bed a sagging
mattress reads like a DNA history
of real and imagined sex.
'Tomorrow's World' on a grainy
black and white TV peddles
dreams of futures
in a language
we've yet to learn.
MOTHER TONGUE
She comes back in slipper-step whispers
–
footfall, creaks on stairs that fill liminal space
the
half-world before waking.
Somewhere
we once
called home; Beaconsfield or Dagenham,
places
some
part of me still knows. Bunched lavender
breaths from white enamel jug, a window-ledge
in a front room lit by laughter that disappears
like in Bergman films
the moment a door opens
and sisters and brothers I never had unlock me
lid by lid
to wander
from cotton-clutched sleep.
This
morning’s
hallway speaks of something
just baked.
Caterina Valente song wafts
from the garden;
a
pinafored back that must
be hers
unpegs a line and it’s always summer
as I race after boxer pup Pedro;
find the wood
we mustn’t visit,
air thick with
pungent wild garlic
and
bird chatter; run until I fall, breathless
–
the gap-toothed boy in a forgotten polaroid
–
a Sunday picnic, his face cupped then kissed,
words she no longer finds, a lost language.
SHEDBOUND
Weekends he escaped to a world away
from ours, crazy-paved corner of garden,
dad-only den; shed air incense of solder,
sawn cedar or pine,
heady,
glue-thick,
cigarette smoke haze punctured by metal
or wood notes from orchestra of tools.
I see him, stick-thin, still hunched
over thoughts, long after day downs
last dregs of light, intent to crack code
of a repair, design some new gadget
or eavesdrop police channel chatter
on radio scanner. I wanted to be him –
drill with dental precision, perform surgery
on circuit boards – but could only watch,
fetch cuppas and brush up. Wanted to be
his hands, hold them steady in later years,
be his eyes that lost focus, now there
in my reflection; growing reminders of him,
another world that awaits.
THE
LADY NEXT DOOR IS LOST
again, summons me from sleep with
familiar bangs and shouts in early hours.
Stands stooped, confused half-smile
and pleads: where am I?
Artist eyes
now fixed into haunted stares. They
say for some the brain stops knitting
neurons, instead starts to unpick itself
row by row, stitches and seams slowly
disconnected from the here and now
until all-that-matters is out of reach.
I escort her home and if, over tea,
ask, let’s
say, about her wedding day
photo in a frame she’ll
light up again,
paint fine brushstroke detail: pearl
white taffeta gown, father’s
words
in the car, that first dance. But next,
another half-smile; she’s
certain I’m
the son who never visits, laughs off
any suggestion I only live next door.
NEIGHBOURHOOD
WATCH
I’m not sure
I should be telling you
but the man opposite comes and goes
at unsocial hours. Heavy-set,
head-down
in hoodie and trainers, our eyes never
meet. And I’ve yet to see him in company
of elderly mother, girl or boyfriend.
Possibly a loner who doesn’t
prefer
a kill
to
a
kiss;
isn’t
a blood-mad butcher
on abattoir streets.
For all I know
on-call electrician or night shift carer
who happens to drive a white van
–
one
I’ve
had no opportunity
to inspect
for tell-tale
signs: knife, rope, tape
or
DNA-trace mattress. And should it turn out
he has no dark side, I’d hate to be labelled
warped
–
Neighbourhood Watch peddler
of malicious gossip. Until I know more,
maybe
best
kept between ourselves.
THE SUMMER IN QUESTION
arrives early in
’76, stays
later than a pub drunk,
bakes us in brick kilns, windows no-one
dare
close;
Don’t Go Breaking My Heart
on radios
all day, stray
dog barks in revolt.
Sundays unrattled by mowers as
gardens gasp
for breath, now watering
lawns or
plants
comes at risk of arrest; alarm of drought
pressed in reservoir and lake.
Bare arms sardine onto buses bound for park,
pool and beach; heat too intimate, clothes
clinging like sticking plaster to lobster
flesh
basted
in sun factor 4 or 6.
Ears always pricked for ice-cream vans,
eons before afternoons inhale barbeque smoke.
Balmy nights we map stars,
sheetless waits
for sleep in sauna
beds,
no whisper
of breeze, owl soundtrack plays in trees,
warm-up to birdsong jukebox. Summer
we
love and
hate at the same time
–
tells everything you need to know.
OTHERWORLDS
Thickened
with post-fry-up strollers
the
Sunday
prom chokes to a shuffle
–
Unrushed
couples, families and dogs
all
out for the salted air and stretch
disinclined to flag
amongst
joggers
or
lycra-skinned
dome-headed
cyclists
bent into roiling
wind
that
scourges
around this
peninsula
tip
watching
tide
drive in on
duelling waves
under
smudged
cloud,
hued
indigo
and violet,
ripe as
a
bruise;
air punctured by
choral hum
–
chatter, spiked cries, high-pitched laughs
and yaps, enough to mask
oystercatcher
fine-piped notes
on distant orange
stilts,
beaks
stalking
molluscs
locked behind
silted eyes, as river
lungs
wheeze
and Mersey Tunnel caged hearts
beat
from otherworlds beneath.
MAN ON A TRAIN
Afternoon sun illuminates office block graphs
as we’re
pulled, station by station, from the city.
He sits opposite, out of place yet unfazed, alert
among sardined, work-weary
commuters,
impatient-eyed owners of devices that ding
and ping to kill time.
His face, taut-skinned, tanned like good leather,
reads a yellowed Gabriel García
Márquez
paperback
with Spanish title, bookmarked by LAN airline
boarding card. I recognise the story; the one
about a shipwrecked sailor.
I ponder
his life and what’s
left of mine: an hour-
glass
of days draining to retirement,
and recall
the boy whose wandering eyes saw futures far
beyond small town horizons;
then
wonder
whatever happened to his dreams
–
and the ship
that never set sail.
UNFINISHED
A table-top
canvas
half-eaten
dishes
knives and forks
askew
lip-prints
on glasses
wine
no
longer breathing
a
room
where silence
feeds
inhales
exhales
days when every
passing train
might be the one
carrying
you
and elsewhere
is a place
out of reach
and what’s left
waits
like Laika in space
MELT
When I said if
and I only said if
we were stone
you pictured street cobble
or beach-smooth pebble
but I had in mind
mountain giant
alpine
first name familiar with anyweather
scarfed
by
monochrome cloud
ring-side
as
rush-hour birds
smoke
past
mackerel sky
and us
tempted to
gulp
flame-thrown sun or shut
storms
off at the mains
and not just that
close enough to choose from menu of moons
and
spoon-scoop stars under umbrella of night
(OK, maybe that’s going too far)
but if
like I said
if
we were stone
and if one day
the world should turn in on itself
turn us into ice
we’d stand naked
naked as newborns and
let’s
face it
watch ourselves
melt
and
trickledrift
apart
because
isn’t that
how it goes?
ON BEDSITS
Published by Amaryllis 2017
MOTHER TONGUE Published
by
Eunoia Review 2020
SHEDBOUND
THE
LADY NEXT DOOR IS LOST
NEIGHBOURHOOD
WATCH
THE SUMMER IN QUESTION
Published by The Blue Nib
2020
THERWORLDS
Published by Beautiful Dragons
‘Well,
Dam!’ Anthology 2019
MAN ON A TRAIN
UNFINISHED
MELT
Awarded second
place,
Yaffle Prize
2019
______________________________________________
4 - Afterword
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We are looking for other poets to feature in
this series, and are open to submissions. Please send one poem and a short
bio to - info@poetrykit.org
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