Partick Granary Eddie Woods

Rap tat-tat. Rap tat-tat. Rap tat-tat,
and a yard of mortar.
Rap tat-tat. Rap tat-tat. Rap tat-tat,
and a yard of mortar.
Whistling and laughter rise up with the morning
Rap tat-tat. Rap tat--at. Rap tat-tat,
and a yard of mortar.
Tap tat-tat. Rap tat-tat. Rap tat-tat
and a yard of mortar.

Untitled S.Sheehy

Ah! my sweet Virginia
how I love you
you have seduced me
beguiled me
enraptured me.
In the night
I relax in your glow
in the afterglow of love.
There is none truer
no greater satisfaction
than your kiss
your kiss of death

New Poems - November, 2001

THE TERROR OF THE NIGHT by Sandra Sheehy

Mary Marshall did her rounds
At 10 and 2 and 6
There was nothing missed her gaze
X-Ray vision right through to our nicks
They had to be as white as the pinnies we wore
Or so she made us feel

We boiled and scrubbed from 8 to 8
Sterilizers never still
The bedpans (stainless steel) shone like mirrors
We could see our faces in them

But you see - we were the front line
(against the evil - Bacteria and viruses galore)

How proud she made us feel
The most important job of all
And we never caught or carried a thing
We whacked the little buggers into oblivion

Now M.R.S.A. is on the march
Dirty hospitals abound
And who knows how to scrub
Can't send for the 'Night time Terrors'
Too many years have elapsed

Requiescat in pace Mary Marshall

SUNDAY by Eddie Woods

The sun smiles
at the dog with the lolling tongue
hiding
under the tree

the leaf dances
with its reflection
laughing at the curtains
pining for the forbidden breeze

the carpet lazes
as the fire sleeps
beneath the mantelpiece cat
napping half-eyed

the cloth works
quietly secretly
gathering dust
in the corner

the spider studies
the fly wandering
aimlessly foolishly
closer

Jam Tomorrow Eleanor Black

Ma Granny used ta say Jam tomorrow
Ah guess she wis an optimist
Every Friday night ma Granpa spent the jam money
Maybe she hoped he'd jine AA
He never did

Anither thing she used ta say wis
Wan day ma boat'll come in
Ah used ta picture this ship
Comin up the Clyde in full sail
The proverbial banana boat maybe
Or da they no hae sails?

Ah knew ma Granny's boat had come in
the day o ma Granpa's funeral
She'd this foxfur hingin roon er neck
heid an tail an paws an aw
Ah hud nightmares that night
In ma dreams the fox came ta life
It wis dancin wi the Robertson's golly
the pair o them were chantin Jam tomorrow
Ah always wanted wan o they gollies

December Days J. Shanley

Autumn long gone
Like spring and summer
Winter now
On a quiet ward
Morphine
Blessed morphine
Stealing the pain
Leaving the cancer
Four seasons
Gone
The syringe
Ah, the syringe

Nothing

By Bluebell

I thought I'd write a poem for you
but my insight it was blind.
I sat and thought and thought and thought
but nothing came to mind.

I'd like to frighten with tales of ghouls
or make you sigh with yearning
maybe even make you laugh
or shock you into learning.

I thought I'd think of days gone by
to make you reminisce
but far from that I thought of nought
and gave the past a miss.

What if I wrote of that wondrous sight
-the rainbow up above
the vast eternal promise
of that true redeeming love?

Perhaps adventure you would fancy
a swashbuckling tale of the sea
-but I've left that alone for the moment
it just isn't my cup of tea.

So now you know what I have done.
As you see it's not a lot.
I sat and thought of nothing
and nothing is what you've got.

Seedlings

By Christina Byrne</p.

Rock and Roll music
Guitar arias
Cannon off walls of sound
Wailing tortured discords.
Was it Lennon delving deep
Was it Hendrix sowing phonics
Who planted them
and who could reap
the crop from such a seed?

If we get an early bus

J. Shanley

Autumn in the Botanics eight thirty am.
Kirstin, five years already
Deserted flower beds awaiting winter planting
Chestnuts cover the ground
Kirstin's delight
There's four in this one
The magic path, a daily ramble
Low level railway
Visible, ghostly
Trees growing between the tracks
I remember the steam
Granpa, is it time for school?
Aye Kirstin, but there's always tomorrow

Whimsy

Christina Byrne

In spring a young man's fancy turns to
thoughts of love
and copulation.
A woman's mind begins to dwell on
tiny feet and
adding to the population.
The race would not exist or
increase in its number
Had Eve rejected Adam as a lumber
For down the ages what is known as love
has peopled continents and cities
and kept the poets busy penning ditties.
And great minds have deliberated
on the burning question of the age
i. e. does Hughie feel the same passion towards Shona
as Romeo felt for Juliet in Verona?

It's ten years on when youthful ardour fades
and marriage hobbles him and keeps him home replete
The young man's fancy turns to thoughts of
B & Q and MFI and wallpaper and prams and tiny feet
But woman exercising her prerogative
to change her mind
says
Sod you I'm off You're too late.

55 Barnkirk Ave - Another Epitaph

Michael B. Scribbler

Can't understand it son
Went across to the Chapel
Yesterday at twelve
Nobody was there
All locked up
Can't understand it

And you know somebody
Smashed Mrs Jamieson's windows
And set fire to number nine
I blame it on those Teddy Boys
But I dont understand it

Another cup of tea son?
And some of those NICE biscuits
Oh and something else
All the ice cream vans that always
Parked outside the Chapel on Sunday
They must have forgotten
Can't understand that.

Come on through and I'll show you
The veranda son
We never had one in Partick
I'll just open the window
Hear those dumper trucks?
Aye the green ones
The man told me they
Would tar the streets tomorrow
But they're already tarred
Don't understand that

Went up to see Mrs Reilly upstairs
She wasn't there
Top flat, Elsie Pollock
A big steel door
I couldn't get through

Sorry Mrs Gordon. You really have to
Go now. You're the only one left
We have to close this close

Go? Go where son?
No you not understand!
The man told me
Tomorrow they're coming to tar the street

Drumchapel Writers' Group

Meets every Thursday at 7pm at Drumchapel Arts Workshop (DRAW) which is on the ground floor of the block of flats at 15 Linkwood Crescent They welcome new members of any experience or none.
Contact: Christina Byrne: 0141 952 4503. e mail [email protected]