Rent a Bench

RENT A BENCH

rent a bench

can i put it anywhere?
sit down whenever my feet
go on strike?

can i choose between wood
and iron?
plain or ornate?
what colours can i paint it?

can i share it with
wannabe sweethearts?

can i eat my lunchtime sandwiches
in the cool of a grove?

can i take an option to renew
in the spring?



what!

i cannot move it
use it
alter it?

only advertise on it!

i’ve half a mind
to sue you
for misrepresentation

do you know the number
of a good bench solicitor?

© Gerald England

Composed: Los Angeles, 12th November 1999

Publications

2001 Green's Magazine (Canada)
2006 Other Voices (Internet)

Class Visit

CLASS VISIT

In the City Art Gallery
a group of children
chatter and squirm,
snigger at the nudes,
disrupt the concentration
of other visitors;
the teacher apologises,
feigns disgust
at her pupils’ behaviour

Back in the classroom
other lessons than art
will be taught

© Gerald England

Composed: Manchester, 27th January 1998

Publication

2001 Greens Magazine (Canada)

What Father Did

WHAT FATHER DID

my father painted
    the toilet seat
after I'd gone to bed
    I was only six

he painted it yellow
    I wasn't to know
I cried but it was
    their laughter that hurt

Turpentine is cold
    and smells so!
He could have told
    I was only six

© GERALD ENGLAND

Composed: Upton by Chester, 16th June 1993

Publications

1994 Green's Magazine (Canada)
1996 Q (USA)
1998 LIMBO TIME (Hyde, New Hope International)
2005 The Spoon River Poetry Review (USA)

First Morning

FIRST MORNING

having woken, coffeed,
walked the dog -
overcoat over pyjamas -,
we draw curtains
to a girl riding by
where the bridle path
skirts our field;
the wind blows
from the motorway;
the rain comes
over the railway line;
here we wait
to hitch ourselves
onto the new year

© GERALD ENGLAND

Composed: Ackworth, 1st January 1984

Publications

1988 QUADRA PROJECT: TEN POSTCARDS (Detroit Art Workshops)
1994 Green's Magazine (Canada)
1998 Black Creek Review (USA)
1998 Black Creek Review (Internet)

Identity

IDENTITY

They called the cat dog
berated her for barking loudly
despite her merely harsh meow
She tried to wag her tail in pleasure
chase cats run with the dogs
She couldn't cry fetch sticks
but tears swelled from time to time
Then someone called cat cat
taught her how to purr drink milk
run from dogs climb trees
Alone but happy she forsook the pack
took to catching mice
and chasing birds

© GERALD ENGLAND

Composed: Manchester, 5th May 1983

Publications

1990 Green's Magazine (Canada)
1990 Truly Fine (USA)
1998 LIMBO TIME (Hyde, New Hope International)
1998 Ygdrasil (Internet)

Gran.

Me and my gran circa 1955.

 GRAN.

Like those others whose grans
were growing old when they were
growing boys, I remember you
for your apple pies and golden pancakes, syrup-laden —
my elder brother often being sent
to bring me home from your bungalow
long after my own tea had grown cold.

That was the time when granddad sat
in the high-backed wooden chair
my mother set fire to when he died —
the sort of chair that claims
a fortune in antique shops today — but
my small, frail gran, I remember you much more
than that gaunt, great man who only sat.

You lived later in our council-house front room,
too weak to climb upstairs, too unsafe
to be left with your diabetes —
twice daily my mother tested your water —
and so that we could take a holiday
my sister and her husband came to stay
while I went with Mum and Dad
to a rented van at Thornwick Bay.

Tomorrow would be Thursday and I'd been promised
a trip on the Yorkshire Belle from Bridlington,
but Wednesday night we learnt that you had died.
That means I won't be able to go on the boat tomorrow!
the first reaction of a saddened twelve-year-old.
Dad attempted logically to explain, but all
unnecessarily — I knew that you deserved the sacrifice.

Twenty years on and I've finally made the trip
round Flamborough Head, past Thornwick Bay,
and back to Bridlington — with my own son
and his gran — his Mum's Mum like you.
Gran! — I never begrudged you dying on that day.
The waves remind me always of you, gran, because
the trip was well worth the waiting for!

© Gerald England

Composed: Ashton under Lyne, 2nd February 1983

Publications

1996 Green's Magazine (Canada)
1998 LIMBO TIME (Hyde, New Hope International)
2007 Ackworth born, gone West (Internet)

I Always Turn

I ALWAYS TURN

I always turn

upon mad dogs
bark back even

that way
i sometimes end up
with my back against the wall
not that all walls
are so thick
that you can't fall through

but mostly
they reject my challange
it's the chase they want
and they can't
chase you
when you face them

© GERALD ENGLAND

Composed: Ashton under Lyne, 1st July 1980

Publications

1982 Global Tapestry Journal (UK)
1988 Groundworks (UK)
1989 Green's Magazine (Canada)
1990 Lizzengreasy Magazine (Japan)
1992 STEALING KISSES (Hyde, New Hope International)

Dinner at Elshieshields

DINNER AT ELSHIESHIELDS

The hitchhiker had brought a black tie
Jeans, sweater and a haversack he thought
might not be right for dinner with a Scottish laird
The gaunt aristocratic lowlander up his purple rhododendron drive
was a daunting smoking-jacketed prospect for the invited youth
We had no fears for him
seeing the sheared sheep at Kirkmichael
as white as whitsun goats and large as mules,
or the playful rabbits of Ae, darting into Nithsdale
with fat black wood-pigeons flying in front of us
Our breakfast came with the morning sun

© Gerald England

Composed: Closeburn, 24th June 1976

Publications

1977 Counterpoint (UK)
1980 THE RAINBOW AND OTHER POEMS (Heckmondwyke, Fighting Cock Press)
1983 Green's Magazine (Canada)
1995 Northwords (UK)

You, Being Absent, The Cat

YOU, BEING ABSENT, THE CAT

Come to our rave-up in York, they said
You being absent, I said OK Why not?
I drank several drinks
enough, no more, not to fall foul of the law
I danced a few jives and a couple of waltzes
I read some poems while the jazz band played,
and said a kind word to the fat girl with glasses
I could have made the available lay
instead of driving off,
mumbling about thirty miles
and a poem to be written

I ran over a cat at Sherburn-in-Elmet
It came out of the dark and under a wheel
The blood was sticky all over the tyre
An old cat, they said, and always careless
It wasn't my fault, they assured me
It was expected to happen sooner or later
Just my hard luck to get involved, they said,
giving me sugary tea to calm my nerves
I drank it quickly, thanked them, said good-bye

If asked tomorrow, I shall say
that it wasn't a bad party,
reaching, you being absent, for another black coffee

© Gerald England

Composed: Sheffield, 10th March 1972

Publications

1976 MEETINGS AT THE MOOR'S EDGE (West Kirkby, Headland)
1992 Green's Magazine (Canada)
1993 The Affiliate (Canada)
1999 Unlikely Stories (Internet)
2002 Blue Beat Jacket (Japan)