Seeds rashly
Scattered
Ground
Underfoot
Latent anger potent germinates

Shot-triggered
Sudden shoots
Watered by
Familial tears
Sweep through startled streets

Rage grows
Blossoms
Bursting
Fire-flowers
Acrid-scented choking smoke


We dread this
Deadly flowering
Yet
We sow
And reap
And reap and still we sow

© Jane James

Tottenham in flames as riot follows protest
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Jane works in Arts & Heritage in the West Midlands, spends too much time
on Twitter and is constantly surrounded by fish.

In what has been a turbulent week, with mayhem in the markets and the news that America has lost its AAA credit rating, Anthony Baverstock's The Tragedy of Obama and Boehner set an ominous tone. While economic analysts were wringing their hands over the 'dead cat bounce', Chris Lawrence's thoughts turned to the deaths of 140 people in Hama, at the hands of the Syrian Army. His poem, Men In T-Shirts, reflects the chilling dilemmas faced by ordinary citizens in pursuit of democracy.

On Wednesday we published Charlene Langfur's, Gift of a Particular Miracle, just two days after Gabby Giffords made a surprise return to Congress, to cast her vote in favour of the debt package. Seven months previously, she had received near fatal head wounds, during a shooting that left six others dead.

And, as one politician continues along the road to fitness, Hosni Mubarak arrived in court on a hospital bed to face charges of corruption and ordering the killing of protesters. Kim Rooney neatly captured the moment in the Cairo courtroom.

Poetry can make the greatest impact when it's kept short and focused. Fran Hill's Progress was perfectly summed up in a comment which read, "All that pathos and irony generated by just a one-word title and eight short lines - a sharp slap to reevaluate priorities. Very efficient and effective." We couldn't agree more.

Heather Wastie offered us The Velvet Glove for Saturday, a quirky tale of spilt shiraz. And on that note, here's a toast to you all. Keep those poems coming!

Sparky's handiwork
dripped from the prongs
of a forklift truck

When they opened up the container
the murder scene
smelled phenomenal

Brett McCarthur gasped -
462 cases
in one fell swoop

When Sparky got the call
he was gut-wrenched
at having to kiss goodbye

to months of hard work,
over a million dollars
and his Velvet Glove

finest shiraz
dropped from a great height
never making the ship

Thankfully he wasn't a man
to operate
without insurance

© Heather Wastie

Australia: Forklift mishap destroys $1m of shiraz wine
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Heather Wastie is a British poet, musician, performer & facilitator, born in the Black Country, now living in Worcestershire.

She turns to her children
who lie silent-curled beside her,
their bodies bloated with
someone else’s shame.

‘My little ones,’ she says,
her lips as dry as crusts.
‘The clever people have
found water on Mars.’

© Fran Hill

Mars: Nasa images show signs of flowing water
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Fran lives in the West Midlands (UK). She teaches English in a local secondary school, writes, performs, blogs, tweets and tries to resist chocolate.

The judge's eyes
stream LIVE
from Cairo courtroom
toward the Nile

Mubarak lies
stretchered, caged, docked
flanked by sons
they too, deny

For this
there is no shock
in Egypt, where long dynasties die.

© Kim Rooney

Mubarak trial: Egypt's ex-president denies all charges
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Kim (aka wordturner) is a writer, editor, and poet. A former BBC online journalist she has an MA in Life Writing from the University of East Anglia.

Some of them happen to all of us.
Like this one. Or that one.
With unexpected recoveries,

returns to life that leave us breathless.
Today I believe the same,
look after
what continues. Night become morning,
look after thin slow-moving lines of darkness
turning to light.
I get up out of bed,

trace light's flow. Look to see who made it home,
soldiers home from Iraq,
Afghanistan.
Made it back uninjured,

saved men and women beating out
the crush of chance.
Inexplicably they are on another day alive
among us

a woman recovers from a gunshot to the head.
The undoing of the worst.
Like flower making it through
a long hot summer.
All of us relieved on such a day.

Is it so? All we can do for one
another exceeds all else? Healing.
Salience. All we know.
Again, tomorrow maybe.

The woman with the injury comes back.
Readying herself to go.
Unbowed

anything is possible.

For Rep. Gabby Giffords January 2011

© Charlene Langfur

Six Months After Tucson Shooting, White House Readies Gun Control Stance
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Charlene is an organic gardener and a graduate of the S.U. graduate writing program.

smoke encroaches the sky
men gather
unarmed
by the barricades
gunfire rattles
a chattering fear,
they move in groups
seem aimless powerless
what to do
to call , to chant
to pray,
to unify,
and hope together
will survive
tank wheels
closer now,
fear a sharpened
swordswinging ever closer
do you hide
inside,
or call and shout
defiance.

© Chris Lawrence


Syrian Army Extends Hama Assault as 140 Die
----------------------------------------------------------
Chris Lawrence lives with his muse in West Kirby and writes, having been published in many journals internationally and can be found on twitter @clawfish.