Everyone,

here's something I've written lately. Enjoy!

Christian

-----------
Pastoral

Landscape moves
like stage scenery.
Clouds roll past
on rusty castors,
jaundice coloured
meadows are brought
in by nervous stagehands.
A backdrop of river
and two amateur fishermen
rolls down. A sudden
stop, curtain swishing across
like the end of consciousness.
That finale, how many times
have I expected it? rewritten it?

Everyone,

thanks for all your comments on my last blog. I'm glad you enjoyed it.

Here's a new piece that I've been working on lately.

Enjoy,

Christian

---------
....................

The Abandoned Houses, Stamford Hill

Glimpsed before they were salted with dusk,

each a deserted scene from Chernobyl

or Three-Mile Island: breakfast tables

abandoned, family photos left behind,

jackets still hanging on the backs of chairs.

Cutlery slowly fossilising, turning the colour

of anchovies. Their undissovable memories

chirp like Geiger counters when the street

is silent, unspooling household wiring.

Sometimes you might see patches

of dandelions in the front gardens bend,

as if in the presence of breath.

This is a repost of an old poem for St Patrick's Day

Enjoy!

---------
Smoke and Silence

Sláinte. The clink of glasses,

another round of the fiddle

and wheezing accordion.

Padraig tells us his stories



in cigarette smoke, pausing

only for another sip of brogue

black Guinness, the memory

of three generations of farmers



and immigrants soaking

into the peat of lung flesh.

A claddagh of cloud hangs

outside the bar. It never rains,



it has never done in his eyes,

there has always just been smoke

and silence. They are his bones

and flesh. We are his clothes.

Everyone,

Thanks for all your comments on my last blog, that means a lot to me.

New acceptances this month:

Sheroes Rag
Shalla
Flutter
Hobo Camp Review
The Legendary
Form Reborn
Thick with Conviction
The Recusant
Every Day Poets will be publishing another of mine
A Handful of Stones have accepted 3 - look out for the first later in the month
Zygote in my Coffee will be publishing two

Folded Word Press have a little interview with me

Rattle have my review of Laurie Blauner's Wrong up

A Handful of Stones have one of mine up

More poetry soon!

Have a good week,

Chris

Everyone,

thank you for all your comments on my last blog. I wrote this new piece for fun yesterday.

Check out my new piece at a handful of stones here

Enjoy!

Chris

-------------
Father Icarus

He hung a teaspoon

on the door instead

of a hat, fed us mud

instead of porridge.



At night we heard him

squirm in the confines

of a bed too small

for his page-like frame.



The dreams produced

were too big for his head

and often dripped through

the ceiling. One morning



I woke with men marching

on my lap. Another,

with giant ants, paprika-red.

The day he left, I found



him by my window, wearing

an Icarus suit, desperate

to fly even though the feathers

had been melted to his skin.

------------------

Everyone,

thanks for all your comments on my latest blogs. I appreciate it immensely.

Some new acceptances as we approach the closing days of February: In the Red 7, Xenith, Volume Magazine, Second Run, Ditch

You can also catch my poem "Floods" up at Every Day Poets and my poem
" The Year the Blackbirds Died" at The Fear of Monkeys

My first chapbook, The Grammarian and Other Poems, has also be reprinted and is available at Scars Publications

I also have an interview coming soon with Conversations with Writers

I'll post the link to that when it's up.

Here's an older piece that I'd like to share with you:

................

--------

More poetry soon !

Chris

Everyone,

Thanks for your comments on my last blog. That meant a lot to me and I appreciate it immensely.

I've received some more acceptances since then: Haiku Scotland will be publishing three of my pieces in their March issue; Claire Askew, Editor in Chief of Read This Magazine and One Night Stanzas will be publishing another for the Read This Press anthology of poems about tattooing, Skin Deep. Acceptances from Envoi, Writers' Dojo and Ouroboros Review complete the list so far.

Love,

Christian


Here's a couple of more poems for you to enjoy:

Sunset

Salmon coloured sky,
white clouds moving onto new lives.
A hint of grey emerging.

-------------
Plath’s Kitchen

Months before she committed
suicide, Plath dreamt of being
absorbed into the kitchen. Her
landlocked tongue, a dishcloth.
Out of lungs and kidneys, pans
and plates. Skin was reworked
into linoleum. Eyes, bloodshot
from watching night’s flipbook
were turned into knives. Her words
became the oven’s gas, actors in rehearsal.


-----------

Everyone,

Here are some new acceptances that I recently received:

Decanto, Sotto Voce, Poetry Monthly, Ink, Sweat and Tears, Crannóg, San Pedro River Review, Sixth Finch, Flask and Pen, The Battered Suitcase.

Translation of Edith Södergran's "The Stars" in Elimae.

My review of Laurie Blauner's Wrong will be appearing in Rattle in mid March.

A reprint of my retrospective look at Robin Robertson's A Painted Field currently appears on Laura Hird's website

A reprint of "The Sea" can be found in the current issue of Wordletting

Finally, take a look at "Moon River" in A Handful of Stones

More poetry soon!

Christian

Everyone,

Hope you're all having a good January so far. Thank you for your kind words on my last blog and I hope you enjoy the poems in this one :)

Acceptances from late December and this month:

Shoots and Leaves, Shine!, Grasslimb, Gloom Cupboard, A Handful of Stones, Tinfoil Dresses, Northville Review, Underground Voices, Every Day Poets, Drown In My Own Fears, Pratilipi (India), Eat a Peach, Nefarious Ballerina, The Rat, Wordletting, The Shantytown Anomaly. Flash fiction accepted by Flashshots and a review in Keyhole Magazine complete the list.

Some new poems:

................

Tristan

was the boy in my class
no-one wanted
to be friends with, for fear
of being turned into a

scarecrow and pecked
at by a murder of crows
before being doused
by petrol at the end of its use.

He was the one who knew
the kind of things
everyone had forgotten -
most highly watched shows

of the '80's, obscure candies
we used to eat - plucking
out reams of facts from his albino
coif whilst his schoolmates

prepped insults. Once I made
the mistake of befriending
him, sharing chocolate bars
as we talked about the small things.

I could see Tim and Matt smirking,
faces quickly turning into fox-grins.
I wanted to avoid my body turning
into straw but it was too late.

Even now I still hear the constant
ca-caw, the crackling of flame.

-------------

Waxworks

I used to dream of geriatrics
dancing on Marilyn Monroe’s
waxwork corpse after visiting
them at the home near the school.

Some would toss her confettied
dress on the ground as a couple
dressed as Madonna and James
Bond paraded down an imaginary
aisle. Then the cut, fade to white.

Waking, we would find ourselves
stiff. Bones, muscle replaced by wax;
hearts held in place like a binnacle,
unsure of their final destination.

----------------

Well nearly. The latest round of acceptances by Read This Magazine, Breadcrumb Scabs, Gutter Eloquence, Bravado, Right Hand Pointing, Eskimopie, Frostwriting, Joyful!, Sage Trail and Yippee ! Magazine have pushed the number of acceptances to 104.

My apologies for not posting the bulletin with a link to my poem in Thieves Jargon