Poems at Bat Bean Beam

In which I fight the spirit-deadening vagaries and vicissitudes of restructuring with Poetry!

Poetry! is of course the humanities graduate’s equivalent to Science!

Alice in the Sinking Garden (after this post)

A tender adder, luminous after rain,
leaves dew-bound tail traces in the grass
that grows, doubled-over, at the edge of the stone seat,
itself the gatekeeper of the sinkhole.

This boggy, grotty circle just three feet wide
rises and drops unaligned with night or day.
A deeper indentation just past the centre
still marks the place where once she lost a boot.

Falling Out of Cars (after this post)

She hasn’t language, nor should she;
and yet we read to her
and tell her everything, more-or-less:
a continuous, uncensored stream.

Your father’s camping up the text
again, my dear; leave that for a
few more years and I’ll explain it.
Listen to your mother,

who has relied mostly on telepathy
(and imagined, so recently,
the measured venous uptake of the umbilicus
as a kind of radio signal):

she wonders if the walnuts
breaking underfoot, or the slight
skid of a rubber heel
on mulching leaves are felt

differently by you; if this
bumping and jiving and crying
and eight dogs barking
might be for you as night and day

while you make your hand-fluttering,
head-banging, solitary way
out and up and head over drumming
heels, in lieu, in unknown teleology of

that first and final journey into words.

Elephant in the Room (after this post)

Edith Swanneck
blood-at-ankle
had time, permission
to go and look

though neither reader,
queen, nor writer
she read the body
as a book

No hand-scribed legends
for that story
no supplementary
moral took.

The Happy Worker (after this post). This is a found poem from a document written by a colleague of mine.

Following this meeting we will be
in the consultation period.

It is important to note that no
final decision will have been made

by the employer at this stage.
The employer has a legal obligation

through our collective agreements
to consult with employees and their

representatives over any changes
which may affect staffing levels or

work practices. This includes
providing sufficient information

and time to adequately respond to
the change proposal. The amount of

time required for consultation will
depend on a number of factors: size

and complexity of the changes
proposed; the number of external

and internal stakeholder groups
which need may need to be

consulted; the timing of the change
proposal (e.g. over Christmas or at

peak times of the calendar);
and the number of other change

proposals also under consultation.
The change proposal document will

include a timeline which shows
length of consultation and when a

final decision will be announced.

Educating Rosie (after this post)

Too early/late
this two-bit breadwinner
takes some/no time off
to put up her feet,

her heel spur
and slight oedema
mean standing/sitting
by the book,

the undiaried months
of deeper winter
go all-maternal,
work-for-work

and in the spring
will/shouldn’t go back
to whatever it was
she does before.