Rising
May 2010
#016
Christmas Cake
I baked a Christmas cake on Christmas Eve Day. I woke up at five o'clock morning to make a dough. I followed up instructions from the cookbook and it wasn't first time when I made this cake. East reacted the way how it supposed to react - it rised nicely. The dough also rised the way how it supposed to rise. Humidity wasn't high, but something happened and the Christmas cake didn't turn right. The family took one polite bite and there was a big piece left only for me, so I decided to treat wild animals and threw the cake out of the kitchen window to the snow on the backyard. I was hoping for the birds to show up. They might be so hungry they will eat it.
Then I went to wash dishes. When I wash the dishes I look out of the window from time to time to see what is going on the backyard. There is a little piece of the garden, little bigger than a handkerchief, maybe the size of four bedsheets. I can see the neighbors house, their lean on, my fence and behind the neighbor's fence there is a tall cyprus. On the cyprus tree I can see my Christmas cake rising. So I dry my hands and go to get my glasses. The cake is still on cyprus, only this time little bit higher. So I watch Christmas cake rising slowly, climbing higher and higher on cyprus. After a while I can see a grey squirrel caring the cake for its tonight dinner.
Marie Neumann
POW! GROW
Rising
It was a very early summers morning. The warm sun was just rising in the sky. I lay in my bed allowing the summer sunlight to stream in through my bedroom window. Somehow getting up early isn't quite so bad when it's warm. My alarm goes off at 7.30am and I rise from my bed. I look out of the window and can see the dew glistening in the sunlight. I stretch out, tired but happy now that I am rising early and I'm warm not cold. I love summer.
Debbie Feltz
GROW
For Carlos
When the bread is rising in my kitchen
I am reminded of you and your true heart
and all your golden words stirred with passion
and honey to taste.
I have seen the bread rising in your eyes
as you watch the world turning
yearning with love and tears
for the great bridge of freedom
to rise up and never fall again.
In my kitchen I am kneading my bread
with sunbeams and a song of peace.
A rainbow shines between us
and upon the bread
as it rises.
Lucia Birch 21.05.10
Stevenage Survivors
Blue Moon
An arc of scarlet lace
Peeps over the horizon
Sitting on the beach
We cheer and applaud
Encouraged, she rises
To take triumphant
Possession of the sky
Flushed crimson.
As her confidence
Grows, she fades
To dusky rose,
Then apricot
And finally pale yellow
With just a hint of peach.
We start to beat our drums
And someone plays guitar
While we take it in turns to sing
And the moon reaches down to us
Her arm stretching across the sea,
And caressing us, bathing us
In her mother-light of love
Peace and understanding
The conversation flows
Oiled by Sangria and Baileys
And the constellations
Are reflected in the inky sea
That swells in response
To her stately lunar glide
Along the celestial route
Ashley Jordan
GROW
Hope???
We watch the sun rise through the ash cloud
and smell the sulphur fumes.
We walk the high streets and see the prices rise above our spending level.
We watch all the uprisings in African countries
and know that innocence will die.
We see religious leaders raise their arms
in hope to their Gods and hear no answer.
We raise our children in the hope
that they have not been given false hope.
We charge forward to Armageddon
with our arms raised in submission;
begging for mercy.
There is none.
Jim White
Flight Of Two Worlds
(Tanka)
Freedom thus unfurled
In flight of outstretched pinions
Trapped in earthly sky
Till only death delivers,
The key that opens heaven.
Jan Hedger
GROW
Repatriation
Six shoulders bare the coffins' weight
Twelve hands connect with natural wood
Sixty fingers curl round tight.
Six heads carry a sense of disbelief
Twelve eyes keep front with tears subdued
Reflective without rhyme.
Six saddened hearts share a family's grief
Twelve feet step with a measured tread
Sixty toes clench in time.
Six hands are ordered for an equal salute
Twelve ears deafened as the engines fed
Rising to cruising height.
Six soldiers stand down at ease
Twelve eyes allow a tears release
Sixty fingers, pray for peace.
Jan Hedger
GROW
The Death Toll Is Rising
The oceans voided of their yield
Our chains of food have broken links
Nutrients leached from every field
Production run on nods and winks
And the death toll is rising...
Esurient, grabbing with both hands
Then, having seized it, let it rot
Rather fill the bloated lands
Than the starving's empty pots
And the death toll is rising...
Draw new lines upon old maps
Preach division, hate and fear
One small world breached by giant gaps
The planet quakes, judgement is here
And the death toll is still rising...
Ashley Jordan
GROW
A New Poem For My 'Dream Collection'
Pipe dreams spiral aromatically
Intoxicating false hopes; but
When brought into reality
They are tampered; into
Mind numbing predictability
Foresight abandoned.
Jan Hedger
GROW
Rising
I suspect that fiction at its best
is scribbled on the edge of sleep,
where sheets and bedside table meet,
where the oddly closed notebook rests;
if the pen were a rod, it would break
with the weight of the one that got away.
Bruce Barnes
Rising
I slip into sleep
then snap into consciousness.
Light through the curtains
tells me it's morning.
Time to get up.
I look through the window;
the world bathed in sunlight;
a new day of hope.
There's noise in the street
after darkness and silence.
From a night full of dreams
to a day full of schemes.
But by evening I feel
quite unsure which was real.
Andrew Diamond
Newham Writers (Monday Group)
Aspire To Dream/White Lace
Climb the mountain of hope
To reach your cloud of dreams
Traverse the clear blue sky
To tread your chosen path
Shoot as a shooting star
To aspire as to who to be
Do not fall as cold wet rain
That washes away your soul
But drift as pure white snow
Touching lives with your grace
Then shine out as strong as the sun
A reflection upon yourself
I dreamt I saw an angel
Dressed in pure white lace
Her wings they did a flutter
As she beckoned from above
I wanted now to join her
To find freedom from the pain
But there was a hand that held me
From my man of forty year
I turned and met his tired eyes
And asked of him one last thing
My hand he then let slip away
You'll always be my angel, my friend
Jan Hedger
GROW