Two Poems by Beverley Fry

Song Tree

At 3 pm
chattering bird-babble
shakes us from the house,
a flying orchestra,
one thousand
morphing birds swirl over,
to settle in the ash.

A dressing of starlings
trinket up bare boughs;
notes on a score,
black cut-out’s,
feather flat
and facing south.

This tree-break interval
this highway rest
for winging minstrels,
one body in their flight
their perch, their song.

A silent siren call
and branches lift,
as shadows rise in shoals,
mid-verse, move on.



White Water

A sheep-shorn hungry land
wind dry and lonely.
Scarred rust red,
with a dead bracken-crust
over tender shoots.

Ewes knot together,
and lamb in scraped hollows.

Buzzards shadow’s trail
the slopes, skim dips,
scour lichen crevices.

Absolution bursts,
splits rock, bubbles
out through silted bogs.
White water-knife,
slices new routes,
sings cascades, leaps fish
on flooded earth.

Massing river sounds gather
as in a record’s repeating curve,
hissing them to the needle’s skip.
An endless round
sucked central,
to an oceans heaving call.

'Wenlock Land' by Paul Francis

1.
Inching its way
up from the South Atlantic
across the years and miles

the snail paced whale
emerges, landlocked:
Wenlock Edge.

2.
The massive Priory stones
mark out the landing strip,
grey pillars paced on green,

the flight path’s ending
where the Wenlock monks
received their sacrament.

3.
God made, and owned the land.
Then came the brainwave : trade.
Who got to own the land?

The lucky, shrewd and powerful;
survivors, favourites of the court,
the rich who could buy more.



4.
An old map named the fields
in a quilt of tenancy –
The Little Batch,

Waggoners Field, Cuckoo’s Nest,
Far Newtown Meadow,
The Big Pale Piece.


5.
Victorian geologists
imperial in ambition
began to chart the rocks.

Wenlock limestone, Shineton shale
are stamped indelibly,
staking their claim.




6.
Within this tiny space, extremes.
The Priory Lodge, sodden with history,
costs thousands to maintain.

Along the High Street, cottages
repainted, in their timbers know
the floods will come again.


7.
Time to declare an interest.
The councillor behind the housing deal
(whose father was a ratcatcher)

preaches development, but knows
the new estate will kill the view,
bury allotments, make him rich.

8.
The town expands
stretching the surface skin
as buildings ripple out.

The shabbiest barn
the smallest plot
become desirable.


9.
Concentric lines spread out
as new-built brick springs up,
inflates the town balloon.

Newcomers at the edge
oppose the further spread
which blocks their sight of fields.

10.
The old dig in. The young
look out, move out. They know
this cannot be their home.

Wages, prices: hemispheres apart.
The myth of ownership
does not belong to them.

'A Golden Fish' by Dave Bingham

A golden fish
from the Ching Dynasty,

in a blue-rimmed bowl,
in a blue-waved sea;

he’s looking out,
he’s staring at me,

that golden fish
from the Ching Dynasty

Trip to Dudmaston Hall, Sunday, 19th May

We started the day with a session in which Paul and Miriam ( from Border Poets ) introduced us to the potential that Dudmaston Hall holds for writers.















Then we went on the Dingle Walk where Miriam showed us a talking tree ....












a millstone, a lake













and the gardens.













We had our shared lunch which, as usual, was more than we could eat and ...












in the afternoon we spent a couple of hours in the house seeking inspiration















which we turned into poems on our return.

'Dwellings' by Nick Pearson

Sixty seven was the year of setting free,
final eviction from a sideshow family life
serving teas from a kitchen in a cave.
After that day trippers out walking the Edge
could no longer stop to meet the Flintstones,
ponder a world deep beyond their window.

No more generations rocking in the hole,
winding the deep well in apron or smock.
No more tinted memories in black and white
of smoky winter warmth and airy summer cool.
No ozone flap of laundry on the roof terrace,
no place for scythe or besom against a wall.

The Seventies ruined Holy Austin for real.
Without guardians she regressed, lost her grip,
let vandals in to ruminate and urinate,
to smoke out and litter out her lonely rooms.
They only made the most of what they found:
house to cave, rock to wreck, dust again to dust.

Lucretia, Benjamin, Thomas, Sarah, John,
all of the names and their earth-honest trades
have gone forever, won’t live there anymore.
But postcard perfect rehab still leaves room
for history’s penknife on red-stone walls:
ban the bomb, a heart; Kenny, Sandra, England.

'The Zeppelin of Kinver Edge' by Tom Bryson

Tom has edited this story so it is now a performance piece.
It can be found in the blog entries for April 2009

'Save the Children' by Dorothy Leiper

Today I became invisible, ignored,
bumped into once, but never bored.
Clutching a red collection box, badge secured
to my coat, I took my place
between the butcher's and Ladies Fashion.
Watched people go by, studied faces.

An elderly gent stood to one side as
his well-dressed companion in
last year's lime peered through the glass
at this Spring's offerings in dusky rose.
A sideways glance took in my tin,
he looked away, wiped his nose.

A friend clocked me as he passed the Town Hall
but did not see me. He was diverted.
Something across the road suddenly had all
his attention. He crossed, eyes averted.

I rock back and forth so the coins clink.
We're not allowed to rattle or shake.
A teenager pretends not to hear, slinks
by, feet scuffing, a sad little dog
dragging in her wake.

A cheery bloke accepts the label proffered.
“Thanks love. That'll stop me being accosted
again.” I can not help but snicker
at the thought of ladies leaping out
at passers by unprotected by a sticker!

A friend comes over to chat, or to mock
Fishing in her purse for coins to donate
I hold out the box, check the Town Hall clock.
My stint is nearly over, my duty done.
She grins, “You look like a living statue”.
“Not any more,” I say, “I'm off. It's after one!”