Neill Fawcett
McDonald’s Scene
A man with a free meal
bought by a fucking liberal.
‘I ain’t hurtin’ no one.’
Limp fries crammed in,
whole face a weak
‘Why?’
‘I ain’t hurtin’ no one.’
The Law led him out
by a filthy elbow.
Led him and his ragged burger
out to the snow.
‘I ain’t hurtin’ no one’,
he said, to the deaf gleaming glass.
Adult eyes went blind.
Kids saw.
He crunched across the parking lot.
A truck fired up.
Fumes bloomed the air,
cloaking curious eyes.
Ex Pat
The worked man
who seeded six kids to the lying age
shares my table by the sea.
Eyes full of sun and waves
he sees his kids falling free
of their virgin to experience
mother.
Sun hangs on his single sleeper
with dead kin and terrorists.
Across the bay a corona
rolls down Koroni's finger
and flailing on orange waves,
ex's,
immigrants,
kids crushed by rent
and summary executions
of those hell bent
on killing 'Us'.
‘Lee Rigby!’
Multi-nationals play in sand
Their castles cast late shadows on
heroes, Brexit, grandkids
ALL
swaddled in the furl of George.
Eyes flicker waves of ire,
husk sun sinks, dousing fire.
Affable dusk abides
rising over distant tides
Cafe lunch
Halloumi with drizzled leaves
and artisan bread.
We drone bomb abroad
blast Pakistani peasants
and are aghast at the nerve
of foreign agents here.
My dog sleeps in oblivious bliss.
How can we be happy?
Look up.
it’s raining.
Fine the Fuckers
What are you doing in this city
on the floor
in a door
in the way
with your dog?
There are better places
to sit on your arse.
Go south,
to the suburbs.
They’ve got cricket pavilions
and fuckin’ millions.
Blame
In Greece they blame Albanians
their washing machines squeak
their kids are too loud
they are all thieves
There are Romanian muggers in Wigan
Mexican murderers in Texas
Syrian scroungers everywhere
The poor piss on the poor.
Open the top draw
where the big boys stash our billions
BLAME THEM!.
Mortar and Pestle
Ornament on a high shelf
sacrificial altar toy
for kid caught crickets
on hot Athenian nights.
A poor mother
ground and ground
grew her kin
from alpha to iota.
ground and ground
to sculpt their limbs
that they might swim
strong the straits to Lesvos.
Be strong enough to cling
to ropes of keeling boats
so they may gather island harvests
with un-scarfed heads.
A mother carried
a mother’s mortar
while mothers drowned
in burning Smyrna’s water.
Neil Fawcett was born in Stockport in 1962. His poetry moves freely between the political to the personal. Fawcett spent many years as a teacher and now spends his time writing in a damp shed, looking after his family or wandering aimlessly around Greece. His recent work is influenced by the great Greek Communist poet Yiannis Ritsos, and he's working on a collection that reflects this influence. Fawcett has been widely published in magazines, online and in poetry anthologies. He has also been well placed and won a number of poetry competitions. www.neilfawcettpoet.com.
Today
Radio 4 prattles on
about British bombers abroad
and their sterling work above
shaking homes in Syria
and their amen bombs
from Saudi to Yemen.
Prattles on about anti-Semite socialists
and the draining of swamps.
What's gone wrong?
Auntie's knickers are in a terrible twist
tangling views
strangling truths.
On Santava Beach
Sand slopes to seaweed
dried like straw on the shoreline.
Small waves lap.
Aphid boats creep between lands
distant slivers of light and dark.
Small waves lap.
Beyond three fingers is open sea
where boats cut arrow tracks from Africa.
Big waves lap.
Storms rush the harbour of Alexandria
and the broken gates of Tripoli.
Washing, washing.
Beyond our third finger,
islands hop to Turkey
where Damascan fruit rots
on minor quays.
Strange boats sit low
cargo salted by sea.
The deaf sea.
The blind sea.
The amoral sea.
Washing, washing.........
…………………………….fruits of war wash ashore
Fruits of war
……………………………wash ashore.
thistles stretch their prickly arms afar
Militant Thistles