Category: poems
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Day Seven, 2023 ROAR Showcase: Rose Bower by Kim Whysall-Hammond
Rose Bower for Gita, wherever you are Enchantment beckoned at the end of your gardenmany climbing roses intertwined into aa concealing bower where we spied on hidden lovershunted magic deer that leaptskywards and away fromour orbital arrows that encircled the world we swapped shoes and dresseseach handmade by our motherseach smelling so differentyou said all…
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Day Six, 2023 ROAR Showcase: Wilma by Kim Whysall-Hammond
Wilma I sit on the stairsof another woman’s houseone I love deeplymy mother was the star to herrockfast grace and kindnessbut stars burn out and die Wilma still shinesher back may be bent buther eyes glowthis house was sanctuaryand freedom to methe love she and hers gave megentle and calm Kim Whysall-Hammond grew up in…
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Day Five, 2023 ROAR Showcase: Incremental Understanding by Kim Whysall-Hammond
Incremental Understanding In the lineup of superheroesyou were the lost housewife your dream of family and many childrencame late and was never enough a restricted life left you resentingyour daughters busy career all that lost time smelt of lemons Kim Whysall-Hammond grew up in London in a working-class family, but now lives deep in the…
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Day Four, 2023 ROAR Showcase: Toxic by Kim Whysall-Hammond
Toxic I’m so tall, I’m so tallYet you raised me to be so small As waves wash an uncaring shoreSo I would wash you with my love As they caress rocks and pebblesI used to kiss your uncaring cheek Waited with the patience of wavesFor you to regard me To see the woman I had…
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Day Three, 2023 ROAR Showcase: Soap Aisle Woolworths 1960s
Soap Aisle Woolworths 1960s Soap smell, overpowering, strongtransfixed meeyes stinging wateringnose and throat burning rawI could not escapehow the counters towered over meI was there looking for youhad lost you in all those aisleshad been crying for so longbefore the scorching Then you found metold me off for strayingroughly wiped my eyesso that they stung…
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Day Two, 2023 ROAR Showcase: Prehistory by Kim Whysall-Hammond
Prehistory Scattered objects unearthedfrom the prehistory of my childhoodbefore writing was inventedand the alphabet was still a rhyming chant A single dusky pink ballet shoestuffed worn mannikinsone disc faced in greya miniature fully functional typewritershiny plastic necklaces Images exist of sunny afternoonsin pools or by riversI carry a floating balloonwith a cardboard gilded fish drifting…
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Day One, 2023 ROAR Showcase: Mother Love by Kim Whysall-Hammond
Mother Love Let me tell you about my motherabout silences and love withheld the need to communicateand the need to escape longing to be praised for what I had achievednot for the compliant proper girl I had never been we kept things light for a long whilesharing shoes and a love of good dressing At…
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Revisit Candice Louisa Daquin’s The Abortionist’s Chair
In light of the United State’s Supreme Court’s ruling overturning Roe v. Wade, I invite you to revisit Candice Louisa Daquin’s powerful poem “The Abortionist’s Chair”. Candice is our 2022 ROAR winner; go read the rest of her work and her inspiring Q&A here. Stay brave. Love, Renwick Berchild, GLJ Editor The Abortionist’s Chair Candice…
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What the Trash Reveals by Renwick Berchild
What the Trash Reveals A woman’s reliquary. Whole photo albums doused in nicotine, each bit of uneaten Shepherd’s pie with scissor snips, split pencils, blue crayon nubs— for don’t you know— I adore blue, in the ways it wantlessly weaves the woad soul through button holes and Cuckoo wasp mouths, in the ways it waves…
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I Miss by Jesse Finn
I Miss Jesse Finn, Poem I miss the nights of a small town. The trains, iron wyrms winding through town, Rolling on in thunderous rhythm, A lullaby louder and a hundred times More calming than lapping ocean waves. On humid summer nights, the fairgrounds came alive As the wild folk proved their superiority in drag…
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