The Owlet, HT11

Seeing is Believing Blind Owls Competition Winner

I was punched in the face When I was a boy In my sight‟s a white dot But I‟m fine with my lot Because I‟ve got a blind spot For you Asked Charlie to lens us a tenner My virtuous humour denied I risked my eyes And got a scleraprise So now I‟ve got a blind spot for you I felt a fist sandwich – The simplest language It made me reel Now you‟ve made me kneel I‟ve got a blind spot For you That blurring of the vision Meant playground wide derision I was a pupil But I didn‟t stoop till I got a blind spot for you My love it couldn‟t be cornier You might say that I‟ve got a nerve Optically challenged With retina damage Which means that I‟ve got a blind spot for you - Robbie Griffiths

Tufnell Park Blind Owls Competition Runner-up

Station, misty streets and that deep black line: Suburbs. I remember the red wine that we drank too late at night together, bagels and jam, tea. Snatches of french prose: ce fut un plaisir Two moons since we were strangers, now I greet them with an embrace, a smile: we meet warmly, as old friends.

You Wanted to Know I can‟t explain how I feel, it‟s too hard To describe. I‟m trying, I am but – My words don‟t work. If I use someone else‟s Do you mind? Only, I heard a story once That fits, please – let me.

The marbled floors lay far outspread And the setting sun soaked the stone.

Languid air cloaked the men As they reclined in Agathon‟s home.

Required of each was an encomium, A praise in Eros‟ name.

And dear old Aristophanes Was fourth to play their game.

“You see,” said he, “in times gone by Humans didn‟t look quite like this.

We had four arms, four legs as well, And spun about like a disc.

But Zeus our arrogance did not well like So split each one in two.

Our bodies, our very souls, were riven And this caused „love‟, in my view.

Because what can function With just one half, Who or what can really live?

So everyone‟s life follows this same path In yearning for our other half.

That‟s how I feel, that‟s what I‟ve been Trying to say all along.

People ask “Do you like him?

Do you love him?” and I do but that‟s Not all. People seem to think I had a choice, that I preferred you.

But I never had any preference for You any more than for breathing.

We‟re two but we‟re one And I need you.

Was that explanation enough?

- Madeleine Stottor

the owlet

- Joe Nicholson

issue 2, hilary 2011 4

1

email: theblindowls@live.co.uk

'Donnish'

Across the road Across the road a dreary church Gathers round the square That it‟s next door to the strip club is The cross it has to bear The children ride their little toys Under an elm spaced lawn Their parents watch benignly Mostly mother‟s with newborns The doors that close the playing in On weekdays form a cage.

But now the gate stands open As the words upon the page.

Through walks a man who stumbles in Bedraggled and he‟s tired Berates himself then gets upset, Unaware that he‟s inspired From this warm seat its hard to say What the morning‟s like for him The leaves whipping around the grass As unfeeling as sin.

- Robbie Griffiths

The canal, and other stories The sky looked nice that night, you said, As we sat in the cold, on the stone.

The smoke curled soft above our heads Until, numb, it was time to go home.

Black as ash but studded with lights, And pink clouds smudging the edge.

Friday

Flat capped and mackintoshed he'd arrive, With the brittle shuffle and dry cough Of a man brimful of fag-smoke.

(His room was poorly ventilated, he'd explain, And he mused too long at night, By open fires, Destroying the letters, Or toasting ).

Unfinished/Untitled

Four glasses of white wine stain my smile and you pull my arm over the cobbles

This is my body, Made out of clay.

It isn‟t quite finished, Wouldn‟t you say?

I pivot, I turn behind- four smiles reach melaughter, My breast lifts, uplifting, like the stars, upwards those cars rushing forwards-

Residual marks were what were left Of wide minds meeting. Coffee'd paper and desk, elbowed As contention and revision took pen across paper.

A gesticulative structuralist was responsible For the winey darkness near the cabinet.

The sofa sagged No longer struggling against The bulky Levisite from Emmanuel.

The angles of the bones, Too hard, too sharp, The casing of my ribs Barely holds my heart.

I run, brush your side, clasp your hand.

- Madeleine Stottor - Joe Nicholson

Disillusionment

Their papers, as requested, were burnt.

Silly money.

- Michael Kalisch

Let us take a promenade around the dreaming spires And think of all who‟ve passed through here that history admires There‟s many more around us who will surely make their name Me and you or you and I, will we be the same?

All around the city poets call like chapel choirs And intertextual tidbits light the intellectual fires Ah watch the time, it‟s getting late, the essay‟s due again We‟ll ponder and procrastinate through the hours that remain

The Stars I look at the stars Distant. So cold They remind me of hopeI breathe in the chill, Hope. So small, the feathered thing.

Last out of the box.

- Robbie Griffiths

I looked at the stars, I felt Hope come, embrace my heart.

My thoughts are grey My thoughts are grey, rushed, blurred, newpaper headlines, folded pages and the scratch scratch scratch of the pen. Some chaos has erupted, radio operators yell, distant alarms ring fire! FIRE! Lists extend, miles of dreams lost in delirium, noise, STOP! wait, WAIT!

- Joe Nicholson

We wanted to stay in the safe of the night Swapping cigarettes, laughing on the ledge.

The lamp glowed hard, a bright white scar Weighted down with wishes and words As the smoke lazed up towards the stars That we couldn‟t quite see, when they blurred.

Only Questions And the Emptiness of Silence - Claire Cocks

In Summer

- William Bond - Joe Nicholson

3

But was the summit worth the climb?

The journey worth the while?

Why did we want to reach the end?

And what did we hope to find There?

The gale wind shudders the big wood through, Beneath the sun that blazes.

But the fire at the back of the eyes that brew, The stir in the boy who gazes, Can match the force of the wind and sun, And more with summer thunder, And I‟m left weary when the storm is done, And the hill of my heart asunder.

I do. I turn, leave through the door. one step, one breath, in, out. in, out.

I‟m running now sun on stone, icy air: every breath chills, freezes me, I open my eyes.

It‟s alright.

2

Straining, striving, Attaining, arriving, You've reached the top The only way left is Down