Some Sort of Joy: Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award Commended Anthology 2021 by The Poetry Society

Foyle Young Poets of the Year Anthology

“The Foyle Young Poets Award changed my life – no question. It could change yours.” Helen Mort, Judge 2012 and seven-times competition winner 1998–2004

Foyle Young Poets of the Year Anthology The Poetry Society 22 Betterton Street, London WC2H 9BX, UK www.poetrysociety.org.uk Cover: James Brown, jamesbrown.info © The Poetry Society & authors, 2022 This anthology and our entry forms are available in a range of accessible formats. Please don’t hesitate to contact us at fyp@poetrysociety.org.uk

Some Sort of Joy Poems by the Foyle Young Poets of the Year 2021

Acknowledgements The Poetry Society is deeply grateful for the funding and commitment of the Foyle Foundation, and to Arts Council England for its ongoing support. We thank Bloodaxe, Carcanet, Clinic, The Emma Press, Faber, Forward, Ignition Press, InPress, Nine Arches, Out-Spoken, Picador, Poems on the Underground, tall-lighthouse, Tangerine Press, Two Rivers and Valley Press for providing winners’ prizes for the 2021 award. Thanks to Thom Kofoed for his beautiful design bringing together images from all of this year’s one hundred winning poems, and to Chris Riddell for his illustrations of the winners. ·

We send very best wishes to judges Clare Pollard and Yomi Sode for their commitment, passion and support for the 2021 competition. Thanks to the dedicated team who helped the judging process: Helen Bowell, Ella Duffy, Keith Jarrett, Rachel Long, Gazelle Mba, Rachel Piercey, Joshua Seigal, Phoebe Stuckes and Phoebe Thomson. We are very grateful to Arlo Parks and Ben Bailey Smith, the 2021 award Patrons, for promoting the competition with such enthusiasm. We thank Arvon for hosting the Foyle Young Poets’ residencies and our co-tutor Arji Manuelpillai, Marcus Stanton Communications for raising awareness of the competition, and our network of educators and poets for helping us to inspire so many young writers. Thanks to James Brown for designing our wonderful anthology cover. Finally, we applaud the enthusiasm and dedication of the young people and teachers who make the Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award such a success. In 2022, we welcome Mona Arshi and Anthony Anaxagorou as our judges, and look forward to finding new voices and welcoming a new community of young people into poetry with them. foyleyoungpoets.org 4

Contents Introduction 8 Abi Vance Quieter than no noise 11 Aditi Banerjee Bodies Blooming 12 Adrienne Knight Sonnet 155 14 Alana Hussein Poison Pancakes 15 Alex Heather Girls 16 Alexander S F— 17 Alexander ZR Detention 22 Anandini Sengupta DEAR MOSQUITO… 23 Anna Heezen Lassoing the Sun 25 Anna Jones Weightless 26 Aratrika Lahiri Pukka Promises 27 Bea Unwin Buy! Buy! Buy! 29 Boudicca Eades Holiday 32 Caitlin Pyper Sorry about the carpet 33 Dorothea Davies Nirvana Rock 34 Duaa Waseem Cultural Warfare 35 E. Haynes Braids 37 Ela Briant There’s a rucksack 38 Ela Rifat Stop Killing the Mandem 39 Elise Withey tell me you are not persephone (c. 1783) 42 Ella Quarmby The Bigger-Half 44 Ellory Hogton The Waiting Room 46 Emma-Lynn Picolo ife Long 48 Eva Westenberger Daisies 49 Eve Hannon Rage 50 Finley Parkinson jessica 51 Freya Cook Listen, there’s a wild god 52 Freya Leech Rain on Iffley Meadow 54 Freyja Harrison-Wood CALIGULA 55 Grace Marie Liu Ode to the summer before 56 Ingrid Fellah Digital Dunes 58 Isabel Lyle Her 59 Ishani Pandey Shame 60

Jacob Keneson Lazarus Leftovers* 61 Jazmine Brett I don’t want to be yours! 62 Jess Sutton Bubbles 63 Jessica Kim Fish-Bodied 66 Jilin Yan a love song on your windowsill 67 Josephine Memmi developing some emotional maturity, i guess. 68 Kirsten Allen Better Left on Read than Said Aloud 69 Lauren Lisk Sunday, Somewhere 74 Lillian Yanagimoto Danaides 76 Lin Zihao Ode to Istanbul’s Blue Mosque 78 Liv Goldreich Hymn to humdrum commas 79 Liz Mbuthi Being Black 80 Logan Care Being COVID 82 Maddie Stoll Shorthand Portraits of my Brother 83 Madeleine Whitmore On Autumn 84 Madhu K This is my land. 85 Magenta Muir Firsts 86 Maille Hennessy Online Lessons 87 Marlo Cowan Functioning 88 Megan Kidd Cupcakes 90 Merit Habib Matta Bilady 92 Merrie LeMaitre 1st march 2021 94 Miceala Morano burning haibun for a burning world 95 Milly Bell Blood 96 Nicole Hur After the Funeral 98 Noah Emmens Achilles 99 Noah Rain Jones Tea 100 Reena Rajyaguru A Rose by Any Other Name Would Still Have Thorns 101 Rena Su Reading tea leaves with my edgiest friends 102 Robin Cox Jo 103 6

RJ Danvers 8.55 104 Rojay Peaches It rough being a mad man 105 Ruby Corrigan Father like you 106 Sarah Fathima Mohammed Tangles 105 Sasha Carter The park bench on Springfield Hall football pitch 3 108 Sia Shekhar White Teeth 109 Sinéad O’Reilly Classroom 110 Síomha Gallagher Charlton Just Breathe 111 Sophie White Big 112 Stas Forte Bright Hours 113 Stefan A. Jinga The Expired Pie 114 Syazwani Saifudin Hear 115 Tamsin Meeks Memories 116 Tane Kim I Miss Poetry 118 Tina Huang Mulan for Magnolia 119 Tom Griffin Hammerhead 123 William Goltz Regular Season 125 Yong-Yu Huang Ghazal for the Body In Summer 126 Yusra Motin Brown Expectations 128 Zara Tosun Useless instruction manual on how to grieve for mum 129 Zoë Legge Aesthetic 131

Introduction The Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award works to find, celebrate and support the very best young poets from around the world since 1998. Founded and run by The Poetry Society, the award has been supported by the Foyle Foundation since 2001, and is the biggest competition for young poets aged 11–17. Each year, we receive thousands of poems from the UK and around the world. In 2021, 6,775 writers from 109 different countries entered the competition from as far afield as South Africa, China, Ethiopia and Georgia, as well as the four corners of the UK. From these young poets our judges choose 100 winners: 15 top poets and 85 commended poets. Last year, the competition was judged by Clare Pollard and Yomi S· ode, who picked from over 14,000 entries. They said: Judging this year’s Foyle Young Poets of the Year was an absolute honour. After a period in which the burdens of the pandemic have often fallen so heavily on young people, we were moved by the beauty, fire and resilience of these poems. These poets write out of diverse backgrounds, landscapes and experiences, and this has translated into a rich variety of form and language. Here are poems about youth, gender, poverty, love, struggle, politics, culture, family. Poems brimming with rightful anger and hardwon hope. We are humbled to welcome all those who participated this year into the community of poets, and know that the voices of the winners will ring out, clear and urgent, over the coming years.

For 2022’s award, all 100 winners of the Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award will receive a range of brilliant prizes, including a year’s youth membership of The Poetry Society and a goody bag stuffed full of books donated by our generous supporters. The top 15 poets will take part in a sustained mentoring programme over the course of the year. The Poetry Society will continue to support each winner throughout their careers, providing publication, performance and development opportunities, and access to a paid internship programme. To aid in helping as many young people as possible enter the award, we have set up a range of initiatives to encourage and enable writers, in school and independently. We are distributing free teaching resources to every secondary school in the UK, and are sharing tips from talented teachers and arranging poet-led workshops. This year will undoubtedly be another full of surprise and strangeness, but even in the great changes of the recent past, we continue to be struck by how privileged we are that the next generation of poets are eager to create poems which offer space for reflection, humour and hope. We hope that this anthology, featuring poems by 2021’s commended 85 winners, will inspire even more young writers to enter the competition.

Our thanks to all of the publishers and arts organisations that donated prizes for our winners

Abi Vance Quieter than no noise Side of a mountain, on a silent day. A clump of heather, purple and green. A bee on a flower, and a child lying still except for the movement in her chest as she watches the clouds float by.

Aditi Banerjee Bodies Blooming Grief is like hay fever. It will turn your eyes to taps for garden sprinklers, and then settle for long enough to deceive you into believing it turned off. When I think it’s gone, it is not. It will make its arrival known unexpectedly and without invitation at a water fight in the backyard at your best friend’s birthday party. Your eyes are still spilling liquid onto roots of garden plants, when the water fight is over. The dead smell like a garden or maybe the garden smells like death. Either way, everything is soil. I cannot tell the difference between a rotting body and a budding rose. They are both in the soil. Soil is a contradiction of itself and so am I. Soil is the birthplace for a bed of life and simultaneously a death bed

for everything too lifeless to exist above the ground. A cemetery is a garden of bodies buried like seeds that will never photosynthesise. When did we decide to plant things that never rise? The garden of graves is dotted with rose bouquets. Roses and corpses are often in the same patch of land. Every time I visit the grave, I imagine what it’s like to be neighbours to other dead things and flowers, when you spent your whole life living and with hay fever. I wonder when your body became unfazed by unexpected encounters with pollen. I wonder when I will become unfazed by unexpected encounters with death.

Adrienne Knight Sonnet 155 You let me wear your watch; I lent you mine to rhinestone, sellotape and leave behind the perfume from your wrist. Another of the silly things we did to pass the time – we’d ask the most specific, pointed questions, listen to the answers like possessions I could save for later, chew them, learn them, spill across the margins of my journals. The world caught up with us. The letters swapped, the secrets, the schemes, the rendezvous, they stopped occurring, in the external sense, at least – the loops inside my head are something else. I see our codes in every place I go, upon my wrist, where time still turns for you.

Alana Hussein Poison Pancakes The teenage girl visited a fortune teller the day before the girl died. “I’m afraid to tell you that love will kill you.” The fortune teller sighed, “How does one die of love?” The girl asked in her head when she drove back home and crawled in her comfy bed. The teenage girl wakes up in the morning and makes some food to eat, she was unaware her pancakes had gone off as she slumped in her seat, someone had poisoned her flour which she uses when she bakes, and that’s when it hit her, she absolutely loved pancakes.

Alex Heather Girls I’m Alex. I like girls. “What, like friends?” No. Like Section 28 forbids you from mentioning. Like all those pride protests in June. Like ‘love’. Don’t you understand?

Alexander S F— For the first thing I feel. For the first thing you find from flexing your tongue. For the instinct. See how you fumble with it. Feel around it. Don’t worry. This mouth isn’t gay. This is the flint. This is you flinging a fast one. Fire follows. For hissing out. Forward in the mouth, your word free in the night. For F-for-gay. For your word for me. For flooding. For your accidental insult. Because this might only mean forget you. Friend. I found you pretending to fly. You have a scooter. Big whoop. You are the motorcycle’s younger brother, just momentum for now. For maybe you’re just trying to find the right words. & this is what you think we want to hear. For Friday night & you’re fast approaching a field of sunflowers, dormant & drowsy. & among these night things, you find us,

feverish in moonlight. For all you know, we could believe ourselves we’re men. My friends & I, kissing fireflies. For foreigner in the flower patch, for how little you feel, & boyish as you feign buoyancy to stay afloat above the flower’s head. & perhaps I said something. Picked on you like you would pick a daisy. Or your nose. So you show us your mouth: the first gun you ever find. For fight or flight. For choosing both & firing fag as you flee. For finding God. For FreeDictionary. For fourteen-letter words because I’ve run out of ways to say I don’t know how I feel. For forcing breathlessness. For farsightedness, for failing to see my face as you see my face. For fragmentations, futurelessness spurred by fear of the letter F. For finding me in your mirror late that night. Because something in my face stuck to you. & I hope a story has followed. F For the first thing I ever felt.

For you don’t even know it yet but you’re definitely going to be gay. For the slippery F that often falls from the sentence but is still there. Familiar as an echo. As a stain. Thank you, girl breaking four-foot. When I fan fingers, fail your test by finding my first-grade nails without a frontward finger-curl. My palms, even they face away from something so unholy—F For I think I was somewhere in the foursquare days. For focus. For beginnings & beginning with fascination & finally for falling for the king. With love. With admiration, I tell him this is the most fun I’ve ever had. For hearing it first on the tape-drawn court & wondering if I should want to cry. For flabbergast. For holding meaning from context. For: this word must be a sponge. For thank you is for F––– For maybe I would fear you

if I found you again. When you find muscle. Maybe I would walk by you at night & holdbreath. & you would be waiting for me. Because I’m the kind of F for fag that you would like to force open with your tongue. Fade. Or maybe you face your mirror & furrow everything like a finished soda can & sob. & call yourself your favorite word. So you say you want to stay a man? F For thank you, films. For showing me shame. For villains, & also for every campfire scene that had to end with a lonely gay man. Or a dead one. For yes: the correct answer was “cry” when the boy you loved called you that. For: I like to believe this is my story of creation. For fast-forward. For forcing my tongue through the doors of my teeth. Across enamel pearls. But cheapened. For beginning with force. Frantic & fast. Like this is the first time I’ve found it. My tongue. For

losing track of possession. For: whose tongue is this? For Don’t worry, this is just a test. For Don’t worry, this is just a test. For fuck test results. For forgetting & for faking forgetting. For bringing you back to flowers: F For spilling something not so foreign to you now. From your lips. From a flushed face when you finally feel it leave. From out from in front of the frenulum. Like the same flex you fumble on in the bathroom. For the little boy I write this poem, the little boy who flung and fled, who found a letter that could finally fill his mouth: I cannot fix you. For: it flies, frictionless. From flaccid. From: try & say it to my face again. To: focus on the muscle. I hope you find your words again. For: What’s wrong? Fag got your tongue?

Alexander ZR Detention Stuck in detention, with nothing to do. Couple of jerks over there, trying to act cool. Teacher taking a break so I say to myself, What have I done to get stuck in this living hell? I might have forgotten my homework, got in a fight. They’re over-reacting, it’s not like someone died. Though That poor bloke, who tried to steal my cash, immediately regretted the aftermath. And I don’t see why, I’m stuck here in detention. ‘Coz when I was in class, I paid attention. I don’t see what I’ve done wrong, But here I am, singing this darned song!

Anandini Sengupta DEAR MOSQUITO… I am just so sleepy, I don’t know what to do! Shall I bathe or go jogging? I haven’t any clue! I am just so sleepy, I don’t know what is right! The mosquitoes were frightful! I was awake for half the night! I am just so sleepy, My system is shutting down. Mum is dressed, waiting, Wearing a fierce frown! She is standing with crossed arms, Telling me to hurry up! “Coming Mum!” I reply, Oops! I dropped my cup! While crossing the garden, I got tangled in the hose, And fell down on the grass Nearly fracturing my nose!

I am just so sleepy, I had a really bad day! I got scolded by the teacher And didn’t know what to say! I am still so sleepy, I don’t know what to do! And, dear mosquitoes, It’s all because of YOU!

Anna Heezen Lassoing the Sun I take the weather personally, as if the sun was purposefully turning her face from me. She seems to delight in closing her golden ears to my pale begging, like a stubborn flaming flower at night. I wish that I could lasso her out from behind the shower curtain of clouds that she has been lurking behind. The sun is a hollow bell, and she rings like the silence between us, a hot, metallic sound that hangs in the air, heavy with the unsaid. Listen to the ring of our silence, listen as I wring her neck, I don’t care if I burn my hands. Haven’t I always burnt myself at both ends? Why stop now?

Anna Jones Weightless every summer morning I choose to be a deity, designing my own image with blissful spontaneity; I free my velvet skin, I let my socks be odd, and the flies follow me because I am decidedly God. arrogance is a myth; the blue sky dares to be endless. lemon & honey, steam rising; everyday ascendance. all of my bikini tops leave my soft heart bare and every summer evening is a prayer.

Aratrika Lahiri Pukka Promises after Linnet Drury after Lousia Adjoa Parker I’m not in the mood for you to leave. Instead how about we go be those kids again? I’ll catch you hovering around the veranda, soaking up the blistering heat I hate so much, but who cares? You always loved those Indian summers. You’ll wake me up at seven in the morning and I’ll grumble as you drag me down twenty-eight flights of steps, don’t even bother to check if the lift’s working. We can bathe in the morning dew before chasing each other in the square lot of dirt grass we called a park. After that, we’ll play cricket with those plastic bats we had, cracked and worn because our fathers played with them and their fathers before them. We’ll scour the sky, only to settle on bamboo sticks as our wickets. Our flip-flops will all but protect us from the sand getting between our toes and we’ll squeal when it reaches our heels. We’ll run off the street every time a car screeches around the corner, the feeling of suspense in our stomachs

never getting old. You’ll kick the rubble on the pavement as we make our way to the puchka stand, the taste of pani puri burning our throats, the sweet sticky sauce dripping down my dress and your palms. You’ll lose the two-rupee coin I gave you a minute ago and I’ll promise to pay him next time, sorry uncle. You’ll give the stray dogs your lunch and my milk, wanting to pet them but I stop you again and again as you sigh longingly and lead me back home – my memory was so bad. My grandma will wait for us at the entrance to the apartment block wearing her silver silk sari like always, getting ready to twist both of our earlobes and make us apologise for panicking our parents again. They thought we could be dead in a ditch but we’ll smile and snicker as we say sorry nani we didn’t know we didn’t know. Instead of you getting on that plane, forgetting to say goodbye to your pukka promised best friend, why don’t you stick around? You promised you’d marry me when we were thirty, don’t you remember?

Bea Unwin

Conten t warn ing eating disord : ers

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Boudicca Eades Holiday My sister plucked two bright round oranges from the little tree next to the adults’ table as if they couldn’t see and hid them beneath her towel. The peel pressed against her naked body fresh from the pool. She ran to me, and unveiled the bounty; we ate like kings that night.

Caitlin Pyper Sorry about the carpet Girl is leaning over Rabbit. Go on then, says Voice. I don’t want to, says Girl, but she does. Just cut the neck, says Voice. Girl picks up the knife; It shines like moonlight on a lake. Rabbit is lying down, awake and snoring. Go on then, says Rabbit – He is bored. Girl takes the knife and cuts A line down Rabbit’s throat. He bleeds. There you go, Rabbit burbles. Girl nods happily. Mother appears at the table, Face distorted in horror. The carpet! The carpet! Mother screeches, harpy wings flapping. Girl looks guilty, but only slightly. Voice told me to do it, Girl insists. Voice is grinning, his muzzle wide with teeth. Mother and Girl stare at each other. Pick it up, Mother orders. No! Girl cries. I’ll pick it up, Voice offers, But Mother is already brandishing Rabbit. Rabbit smiles a bloody, gentle smile at Mother. Sorry about the carpet, he wheezes, But Mother has already flung him across the room.

Nirvana rock.

From Beatles to Stooges with some tricks from the Pixies, blending their influences like mixologists so you can smell their spirit in every bar.

The sweaty, introspective, rhythmical, hip swinging nihilistic isolation of Nirvana verse, interspersed with the visceral tribal roar of the chorus is today's hypnotic thrill.

Music is magnificent - like a rag rug of thoughts, emotions and influences all woven together in a new way, reaching across time, physically moving, manipulating mind, body and mood, resonating differently with everyone it reaches.

Dorothea Davies Nirvana Rock

Duaa Waseem Cultural Warfare

nanu, i am sorry that i didn’t call you nanu. you wrote words for me that i could not understand. you spoke to me in tongues i could not understand. now i understand. why you left me with your foreign smiles, with my mother tongue. still outstretched, lisping phrases i cannot understand, in a distant dialect.

is it my british drawl? or is it my mistaken pulse, the one that beats inside of me, to the sounds of royal anthems? or should it be to the sounds of dholki drums? the ones that reside in lavish wedding halls, reserved under the layers of dust we left behind. i can hear the drums. i promise i can hear them, nanu.

E. Haynes Braids

After a few weeks rogue curls tend to escape – break free from the rows and so... Action must be taken. You in her grasp, finger over curl under coil skin to hair to skin: no gloves, no scrubs, no Brummies in blue. Coconut oil relaxes the spirals, a welcome respite from Diazepam and cold saline.

Ela Briant There’s a rucksack There’s a rucksack on my shoulders, and it’s full of bricks which clinks and thunks and ticks like the taunting threat of time. There’s a rucksack on my shoulders, and its straps are digging in, which cut and scrape and bruise me thin like father’s knife when it stabs so sharp. There’s a rucksack on my shoulders, and it’s tightening around my chest, I can’t breathe, I can’t see, I can’t think my best. Like a wave, I’ve drowned and I hope I’ll suffocate instead. There’s a rucksack on my shoulders, and I can no longer walk, its thorns have risen its vines around my throat so I can’t talk and I think I’m stuck in a sludge of mud, lost. There’s a rucksack, those tears all dried up.

Ela Rifat Stop Killing the Mandem

Conten

t warn violenc ing: e

Stop. Just stop. Stop the hate and the pain that’s being caused. Just stop. The looks, the pauses, the whispers, the side glances and saying what differs. We have seen it all, we stumble and fall, but we need to stop killing the mandem. If the police got a call and it was said we are looking for a black man about six foot tall, and they arrested an innocent soul, the explanation would be that he matched the description. What about his mum or dad, balling their eyes out from sadness? That’s just madness. The daughters as well as the sons; accused of things they didn’t do, and when asked if they know what they have done in a teary voice they say they don’t. That’s just how it goes, but the reality is no one really knows. If someone goes around saying slang it’s automatically said they’re in a gang how do you know? They could be the next right-back for a Premier League team, or the next Steve Jobs at only eighteen. Who knows? So just hear me out and stop killing the mandem. Racism is taught, not inherited, and that’s only part of it. We all learn that black history started with slavery, but it didn’t.

Years ago, the N word was used as a label. If you were black and walked past someone and they said it, you would have to take it. That was hundreds of years ago and hundreds of years later it’s still being used by people who shouldn’t be saying it. I’m not going to name and shame, but you know who you are - don’t play that game. You say this word and you get called out, so you think an apology video is going to solve it? News flash - it doesn’t. Who are you trying to fool? If a man says he can’t breathe, let him breathe. If a girl says she can’t swim, don’t drown her. If a man was just going out to get some exercise let him get some. Don’t shoot him. And if a woman did absolutely nothing wrong, don’t shoot her eight times. The list continues. So, there I say I beg of you, stop killing the mandem. We see what’s on the news every day, and the stuff that’s not on the news gets delayed. When youths make raps or songs about gang violence and drugs they are called troubled, and we need to act as if we never said it and we just mumbled. Then, after these songs are released, we are asked why we write them. The reason is to educate - just to set the record straight. So just to get this through your head:

stop killing the mandem. If we took our skin off our bodies, we’d see we’re the same. Same amount of bones in our bodies and same colour blood. So why are we making these innocent people’s families cry so much? No one can answer that question. So, after all of this I hope the message is clear and people stop that hate and fear, so once again - to get it through your head STOP killing the mandem.

Elise Withey tell me you are not persephone (c. 1783) i. Dear Caterina, the orange trees in the courtyard are blooming again. I pray that you are well. I hope that you will come back soon.

ii. Dear Caterina, the priest came by again today and the room still smells of incense through the heady orange blossom. I am ill, he says, he says.

iii. Dear Caterina, picking season is here but you are not and your basket stands empty by the door, slanted in sunlight,

oranges like bruises across the bright lawn. There will be no happy ending. You promised me this. History has never been kind to girls like us. History will make witches and wives of us, but you did not say we would end like this, a quiet house, an empty bed, an orchard heavy with fruit and not enough hands to harvest. Let history end us. Let me have you now, peeling an orange in the kitchen with steady hands, four o’clock sunshine and dust hanging breathless in the air.

Ella Quarmby The Bigger-Half On the bench In the kitchen Of this-year’s-house A chocolate-coated knife Cut the bigger-half. I got the bigger-half. I am the bigger-half. At her bad joke We ugly-laugh, Ugly-cry With our ugly-face, Same-face, Half-a-centimetre-between-freckles-face. And she got the bigger-half. She hates My favourite song, The lyrics don’t make sense. Out-of-tune They don’t rhyme, We’re never out-of-time. “From the top?” “No, half-way.” “Which half?” “The bigger-half.”

Green with envy But the green of a clover. The glitter-glue has since dried Yet on Moon or Mars Less than half-a-metre between And never the bigger-half. Forget roses. More than half my photos Are of her ugly-face, My face, Same-face, Not-so-ugly-face. She’ll know what I mean, Because she got the bigger-half. I am the bigger-half. But she’s the bigger-half Of me.

Ellory Hogton The Waiting Room Tomorrow we go to the waiting room. We sit in silence, Listen to the incessant tap of a keyboard Under cheap acrylic nails. The cry of a pink newborn. Fever high. The tutting of a middle-aged woman, Glasses hiding the cataracts in her eyes, Spreading like butter on hot toast. A man snoring softly in the corner, High-vis vest still on. The work still Sticking to his skin from the gruelling night-shift. A young woman in a hijab covers her mouth To cough. Tar like phlegm coating her throat. And the silk fabric of her headscarf rubbing Against the plasticky walls. A daughter leads her elderly mother to The squeaky seats. Her rich coffee coloured Hand lay on top of her mother’s, The skin white and paper thin. They think she is her carer. She wears no uniform. Just a sad smile and a gene for diabetes. Someone’s son whistles along to the Quiet buzz of the radio. He knows the song. He wrote it. Sang the high-pitch chorus 50 Years ago, with John and Paul. No one believes him. He’s only 20 years old. Children scatter like ants to honey, flicking The sticky pages of worn books,

Holding a red-hot ear in one tiny hand. The father sighs. He was supposed to Be at work. He has a meeting in five. We sit in the waiting room. Sometimes, our skin sticks to the chairs with sweat. Sometimes we shiver in duvets like winter coats, The heating always broken. Us broken. Waiting. Waiting for day we are healed. The doctor will see you now.

Emma-Lynn Picolo Life Long I’ve noticed when family comes, My superstitions always hide, With hidden silver under thumb. In unsafe places in my mind, I think that I might tell them no, Raining down their hypocrisy, Pretending like they always know. Making sure I’m not left in peace, They nag until I lose my mind, They plague me with their gleeful taunts, I wish I had a better kind. They keep me where they haunt and haunt, And tell me that I am a drag, Perhaps in time they’ll tire and go, They grab all patience like a crab. Would I finally be alone? To finally have my time back? I doubt it, they will never leave, And I’ll be stuck under attack; And I will never gain reprieve. I’ve done everything I can do, My eyes and ears and even skin, Have told them that they should move, yet, Have fallen prey to delusion. I’ll never have my time today, And I shall never once be free, From my family holidays, As long as I shall ever breathe. (Read every second line) 48

Eva Westenberger Daisies We used to walk, in these fields. No, stride, with such confidence! And joy, as our smooth, compact hands Streaked with the dirt of child’s play And exploration in that unknown world Brushed the long grasses, heavy with Blooms and their heady scents. We would Gather the daisies in jumbled piles, Fumbling with those delicate stems so Easily pierced with a sharp fingernail. And then their crushed little forms all Strung together, leaking sticky juice All green, woven into haphazard crowns. Or bracelets, perhaps a necklace even To adorn our tender young throats. Perhaps if, now, I stoop and gather A hasty handful or two, I might regain A fleeting fragment of a carefree past.

Eve Hannon Rage I sing a song of abuse No use, true or untrue it does not matter to you You, who sit and stare and shake your heads and laugh Silly girl, silly girl There’s no gold on your path Mouths open, knives raised Fazed, I kneel and feel wounds open and it’s real My pain, but again you gnash your teeth and shout Silly girl, silly girl With lava in your mouth In the valley, anger is a pyre Desire, seen in a dream with a violent man’s screams Behold, swoon they are told, and to me those writers turn Silly girl, silly girl All your bridges will burn Shackles are the price I pay Say, pity for a voice with no choice but to shout out to the crowd Loud, and monologue my thoughts, until I am dragged off stage in a fit of rage Silly girl, silly girl Shut your mouth Can you blame my broken brain? Pain, shift the blame to the guilt ridden girl you call insane New page, ink from the pen as I sit and write to escape my cage So I may plunder Zeus’s temples So the sun may see my face So someone will see me as gentle So I will win this stupid race So I will stand up and pace with the other girls trapped in this cage Loud girls, loud girls I share in your rage 50

Finley Parkinson jessica jessica wants me to follow her to football practice, kicking round school in the dark after hours, her boyfriend, her best friend and me, at her heel, and jessica wants me to play with her hair again; her voice sounds like god, so i do. it’s late in the night with my teeth on my thighs that she brings up the topic of dying, and jessica wants me to go talk her down again, so i do, so i do, so i do

Freya Cook Listen, there’s a wild god After Tom Hirons Listen, there’s a wild god out there and she’s rattling at your windows saying ‘let me in’. It’s okay that you’re bleeding all over the floor; wipe it up and let the wild god drink it. Maybe you’ve always been bleeding. Maybe there’s a lifetime full of blood to serve up. Make yourself the feast and let the wild god drain you hollow, drain you empty, drain you an unending static. This is how to be a gracious host. Listen, there’s a wild god out there and she’s rattling at your windows and there are daisies where she once stood. There’s a wild god in your kitchen, smoking out of a pipe, and drinking a shot of your grief and madness and pain. Make yourself the feast and let the wild god drain you kind, drain you sane, drain you happy. This is how to be a gracious host and survive. Roses are on the countertops and pansies are seeping out of the cupboards. Maybe it is enough to let the wild god take care of things now. Maybe it’s enough to give yourself to the feast, to the ritual you cannot refuse, to the echo of divinity. Maybe it is enough to let the wild god consume you; strip me bare and find me peace.

Oh, devouring eternity. Oh, trembling beasts. Oh, fragile tapestries of moments. Oh, the glory, the gold, the exposed truths stripped bare. Oh, wild, wild beings making something out of darkness. Oh, wild god make me something out of my darkness. Listen, there’s a wild god walking out your door, queen of the feast, sated, gorged on everything you could not hold yourself; we are boneless now. We are rearranged atoms, a frenzy of rediscovery. Oh, the hollow bones have room to hold joy.

Freya Leech Rain on Iffley Meadow The rain chills Tracing the gap between trouser and shoes Undone laces flick lazy mantis Shower legs in sludge Just one mistake sinks anyone

in grey water

A blessing On whoever remembered to get new shoes A hasty hopscotch among the reeds A green woodpecker slings itself up from picking among roots Geese plop into water, huge bath toys Cow prints are little lakes molehills islands The English winter in our breath

gulls tiny boats on green

Freyja Harrison-Wood CALIGULA I threw my pearls to the night born tide, Watched moon-bleached skin unravel, Peeled at the edge of childhood like a mandarin undressed. Summer ripened white lies, Almost too pristine to be disembowelled, unfolded On the bloody bathroom tiles wet as a still beating heart. Dissolved, they sound like bombs unspooling brain, A muffled cry clinging shy to the harbour edge. If a pearl’s blood turns tide to oil, Black, bulging, boiling in the grip of white hands, If a body gleams like a conch shell in pieces, Flesh buried in a smothering obscurity, If a plane can be crushed like a coke can in mid-air And pour down a sickly, fizzing hell, Can we consider ourselves symptoms of a bad dream?

Grace Marie Liu Ode to the summer before take me back to summer ‘19 when the koi fish rippled the gentle water dying the sky red & orange & white upon lily pads we let naked fingers skitter over tickling white lips oh, how we teased take me back to summer ‘19 when the peaches were pink-cheeked succulent with juice that trickled down our knuckles / stickying our fingers fleshing us out into wide-eyed children of summer encapsulated: a nutty brown pit one bite / teeth grit / spit out into the flush of our crescent palms take me back to summer ‘19 when sunflowers waltzed to seasons’ orchestra and we watched clapping (until it stung) xiang ri kui, you said dressed in accent and a yellow t-shirt outstretched arms as you praised the performance

it is the privilege of humanity to undress a sunflower see it raw / waving / alive and to applaud it take me back to summer ‘19 when the 7/11 tiles were cool beneath our suntanned toes hanzi left to right lettered in neon illuminating our faces like a scoreboard as we let the a/c ruffle our tank tops because we with the flower-elved grins & nectar-dusted freckles didn’t know any better take me back to summer ‘19 when we stripped our towels wringing our chlorine-kissed hair droplets raining down with left behind laughter on our tongues like we knew a secret and maybe we did for when i looked up in your eyes swam crinkled koi fish painted with citrus tails gently waving as if they knew, too

Ingrid Fellah Digital Dunes With the lockdown easing, Cherry trees blooming, I ask Mia to come out and play. She says no way – Thanks, but today, I’d rather stay. Maybe tomorrow. Blossoms yield to green leaves. It’s that time of year, We used to pet the wild perroquets. And I am still waiting. Adrift in a digital world Of endless hallways, infinite tunnels, Wearing virtual reality goggles She dives from high resolution skies Of ones and zeros. Imaginary heroes. Dreams on standstill. At first, it was just to chill Before she lost her way Amid crystal castles and digital dunes.

Isabel Lyle Her It was sweltering – a day straight from your favourite trashy book. We sit in the sun, our legs intertwined, pale bruised thighs against slender brown legs, although she never compares herself to me. It is too boring to be someone else so she just quietly sips her iced coffee. She likes listening to podcasts, the ones that I am too dumb to understand, with names like ‘girl hustle’ and ‘break hearts not promises’, the same song from 1985 on constant repeat, so much so that even the twang of a bass guitar reminds me of her in every way. And sometimes I think she looks like the word warmth, if the word warmth was a 5 foot 5 girl with brown skin and eyes like sunflowers. My coffee is gone so I suck the ice cubes. My cup is empty but my heart is bursting with fullness.

Ishani Pandey Shame Cut out your tongue Take a knife and gouge out any traces of your mother language Purge your tangled roots from lips and teeth Bleach your skin Peel away at your flesh until this colour washes away with the blood Leave dull white bone hot and fragile at touch, bisque freshly fired Burn your clothes Quench the fire in your throat with fires that crumble silk saris to debris Jeans and crop tops sole remnants among bitter residue Choke your heart Bleed the history out of a bruised and beating beast “out, damned spot!” Fingers ravaged and red and sticky with shame Wash your hands Run them under silver taps until red turns to white but the shame doesn’t move ‘Too brown’ turns to ‘whitewashed’ and the shame doesn’t move.

Jacob Keneson Lazarus Leftovers* Putridly beautiful: you, Arisen from the clotted dump, You, smothered in chicken fat And burial wrappings, You, with your chain link Ligaments all knotted up, Scraping out a love song——— Lord of eggshells and spoilt milk, Teabags and UXO, you; Give us a shrapnel smile, darling. Show us your dragon’s teeth; Come out of your lobster shell Tupperware tomb, Give immaculate rebirth a crack. [*The takeaway saint/Exude & exhume/The heart that’s ripe for eating]

Jazmine Brett I don’t want to be yours! I don’t want to be yours. I don’t yearn every night, I don’t fantasise about holding you close or vice versa. When I saw you for the first time you left me gasping for breath, I thought. But it was just my asthma. I don’t want to be yours. I am fine by myself so you can stop – please stop trying to charm me, I don’t want to be charmed. I just want new socks soft blankets friendly bear fluffy like a human burrito. I just want to be a burrito.

Jess Sutton Bubbles I want bubbles – bright, buoyant bubbles Bright, buoyant bubbles that bedazzle from the background Like summer baubles but there’s no tree to be found Instead a sky Let’s put our houses in these bright buoyant bubbles so we can fly A bubble for my house and a bubble for yours We can watch bubble TV and we’ll have to do bubble chores That will be okay though as we can work from our bubble homes On the bubble network using our bubble Chrome Books So we’ll have more time to relax Take a bubble bath, read a book, learn some bubble facts There’s bubble school on the bubble network Which can be a bit tedious but there are some perks There’s no exams – you can only bubble self-assess Meaning I can say I’m as good as fairy liquid when in all fairness I’m probably more like Aldi’s buy one get two free But bubble off because that is none of your bubble business actually You have to exercise in your bubble and go for bubble walks And FaceTime all your friends in their bubbles and have bubble talks About the scum and the froth of being in our bubbles Away from the world and all its troubles And even though I have time for a bubble bath And to watch a bubble comedy and to have a bubble laugh I’m starting to miss the worlds mess and stress As I’m floating further away from the urban wilderness And just because we’re in bubbles it doesn’t mean our problems have all popped Loneliness kicks in as we orbit the world we once walked I hate to hear the stories of the people who are alone

I’ve never felt so blessed for my bubble family in my bubble home Or for the people who have the vocation Of bubble healthcare and education So many work so hard in bubble isolation And our bubbles are too far to show proper appreciation A bubble for your house and a bubble for mine I never thought I’d want these bright, buoyant bubbles to burst at one time But they can’t for a while and they won’t and we all know why So I keep trudging up this mountain and slipping down the other side Every soapy, slippery day comes around without a hitch I’m starting to not drift towards bubbles as I once did For they seem so strong yet they pop so quick And all the iridescent angles make me feel sick I’m pounding on my bubble wall I’m droplets on the floor Once inflated and bright, I’m nothing anymore I miss the world and the mess and the stress I want to wade through the wild wilderness Of tube trains and parties and restaurants and festivals Instead being barricaded in this breathless boring bubble Then my phone bings It’s a friend who I haven’t seen for a while Sends me a funny picture which makes me pop a smile I text back and we talk about the bubble trouble And we laugh as there is nothing else to do in shared struggle I was so deflated but now I feel more full Maybe not airy-light but at least hopeful That one day our bright bubbles will be able to burst And we will hold tight to all that we learnt Maybe even babble over our bubble memories How we got to spend time with our families

So in summary Even though being in a bubble might hit heavily One day it will be nothing but a memory So I’ll try to enjoy my bubble bath and iridescent view Because even though it’s hard we can all get through Together

Jessica Kim Fish-Bodied In Korean, mom means body. I imagine a body shaped like a raw jeon-uh, silver-skinned but small like a daughter without a homeland. To survive, I memorise the muscle-movement of a mother tongue, watching eomma’s swollen lips waver across a foreign coast. Words unmouthed like broken apologies thrown out to sea. See, in my language, uh means fish; in another, it is the dehydrated whimper of eomma on her deathbed. She clutches my palms in a plea for me to return home and I understand now, that han-guk was never mine to begin with. I forget how to translate death into elegies; I instead liken eomma to a jeon-uh, greyed and dried out, unable to live longer than two days in a water tank. The country is a cage of self-destruction. I pick at its ripened scales, then admire its upturned belly, whitened by the bygone summer. It is early autumn: not a season for death, but completion. Eomma chews a jeon-uh in its entirety, both flesh and bone meshing into cremated ashes. I choose to dispose its softened skeleton, to cleanse away this sickening obsession, to renounce a language that cannot differentiate mother from a body.

Jilin Yan a love song on your windowsill I blew a kiss to the wind’s brittle fingers. It lit the sky on fire. The clouds cackled as light spiralled, as buckets of delight tipped and fell. I stuck out my tongue to remember it when it melted into dirt. It was absurd, rich. I missed it when I tasted it. I miss it still.

Josephine Memmi developing some emotional maturity, i guess. we sit under a sky that’s been described a thousand times before my eyes were formed. you talk. i listen. i talk. you listen. it’s nice, i thought. it’s nice to find my feet outside of make believe; thirteen is too old for imaginary friends, and my personality extends beyond giggles. and it’s nice to have you know. and it’s nice to know that yours does too. the sky looked like honey, by the way. deep amber with green seams. we get back to yours at nine. i felt bad. very teenage (ew). there was a lightning storm that night. i woke on the guest bed to the whole sky flashing white – a sick shock – and i forgot where i was for a second. after that, i couldn’t sleep. i spent the small hours watching the heavens twitch with electricity and this is just a memory and i hate how my mind tries to cheapen it by finding pathetic fallacy or foreshadowing. the sky doesn’t give a damn about my life.

Kirsten Allen Better Left on Read Than Said Aloud sorry we are late gain agian* again** but tbh with u man U took the car never seeing how fast we cycled skulls almost smashed onto the back of a parked seafood van that delivers every tuesday @ ten seen only in this long and unwinding summer if U never skive wow. thank you so much for that advanced warning. 30 fucking minutes before. Yeah well there’s a lot of ways I’ve thought about DYING but ending up in a neighbour’s FISHCAKE may be my least desired FATE!! second only to being scooped up by the claw machines workmen use my fear of being BURIED ALIVE is why we took the longer route! 69

Whatever. Quit shouting. You actual are the worst At making Plans. Nooo my mums just super stressed out rn u don’t understanddd if I leave on time I leave behind an unwalked dog bark n whine aaaanndd I didn’t have change for the train My card declineeedd yeah right this place is rank. don’t leave me here. this creep is staring. Don’t worry we’re almost there! Vic we really are sorry <3 It’s my fault not theirs And those fashion brands They stitch up the top of pockets! What a scam :/ In the absence of cool dips And a refuge for trinkets I lose everything

My cash My keys Time is a concept Vic If you look at it like that whatever you guys suck. I called my sister To pick me up. Yous waste my life. I’ve given up. wait I’m sorry too! I get ur counting each minute a sin of ours but if we cycle any faster we might just speed into next july or mid-winter where we will surely find our friendship beaten into the long dirt road to your meeting place a roadkill dead as anything Never pressing send.

Kyo Lee culture blender I am from cherry blossoms and instant ramen blood stained pages of cartoon Joseon Dynasty of Korea: I am shimmering maple syrup draped on crystal snow refusing Kimchi that tasted like my mother’s hands (and whatever other traditional food Canada has) I am from “only speak Korean inside the house” and “do not ever use Korean out in school” I am from the bustling Lunar New Years with too many relatives skin tingling hanboks and pumpkin jeon of history and giggles I am from screaming “Happy New Years” in sync with the radio over flashing fireworks through the Atlantic sea I am from “you’re disgracing Korea by acting like a whore,” and flipping my morality switch to match the standards of my nation I am from “at least you’re not Chinese” and “so what kind of Asian are you?” I am from the bitter oceans of Jeju island slithering into the charcoal wounds of xenophobia I am from the child-like brush strokes upon Easter eggs detesting piano and the Google Translate version of Hamlet

I am from The Office, scent of manure and pretending as if I don’t speak Korean I am from the remnants of the white saviour complex and “petite Asian girl with small tits does step-brother’s homework” the blanket of fetishism hidden under the mask of equality draped over my shrunken shoulders I am from ‘fuck’ in Korean”

and “teach me how to say

I am from “act Korean in front of your relatives” and “be more white because we don’t want white people to think Korean people act Asian” I am poems in both Korean and English laughter of different cultures scars in two languages and love of all kinds

Lauren Lisk Sunday, Somewhere We are late to get to church and then it is Sunday again as we pass around funeral notices and pray, lighting candles out of our fists as we thank God that it wasn’t a boy with his knees bared onto concrete today. The mother is crying out that today was not the last day of her boy who has fallen first, with his fists cuffed behind him so he can’t pray. Today his photograph gilts the church and he is on the altar. He is dying again. Then we are leaving early again. Dressing in grey for the trial of a boy like we can’t bear to be black today; like we can’t bear to clench our fists, pretending that they are palms to pray that we won’t be lying in church tomorrow, I choke on the church after the choir sings of punctured fists; sings of cops crawling highways today, speeding down streets like the life of a boy who is a son: shot again and again and again. And yet his mother still goes to pray.

My mother begs me to go and pray and spit praise over the body of a boy, as the fathers and reverends are dying today: dying without their suits or collars again and again. The bells ring midnight as they bury their church; blood is leaking from my pastor’s fists. We punch the ground open with our fists chanting a new gospel silently for the church whose gravelled ground is a graveyard today: we are its darkened diggers again. I want to forget this boy and that boy and this boy. I pray I forget. I forget to pray – as today in church a new mother sits alone, her boy’s futile fists pale above her. We do not sing. We do not pray. They die again and again.

Lillian Yanagimoto Danaides The bronze pot scowls & leaks. Lean flock, we march upriver, bear his weight through twilight. Each path we cut seals up behind us. Dull-eyed, we’re sutures. Or statues. We fill our hands with river-water, cupped cold bite, and loose it in the pot. Over and over, he winces, dribbles. Always emptying: that’s how it is. Remember when Father herded us into the tiled hall, where we danced with husbands, ruddy, bristled, fifty brothers? Later, fifty times, we twisted hilts, watched neck-veins cord. Forty-nine times men bucked

and bloomed, then sputtered out. It was a crime, too, to disobey. Now we move in search of water, long-lost pitchers gone to sand. The pot drinks endlessly, leaves a dark wet trail behind us. White-robed, we’re spectres. Or sisters. We cluster home.

Lin Zihao Ode to Istanbul’s Blue Mosque The liberal sun comes, and its smile glistens on the deluxe domes. The cordial sky had its ears fixed on listening to the sounds of prayers. Inside, genial lights hang, chatting to the blue tiles with a mouth full of slang.

Liv Goldreich Hymn to humdrum commas Foetal leaves, hairs of strangers on plane seats, the lip of a glass glinting in the dark, shadow of a brocade curtain ruffle, a bed dented where lovers spooned, a lonely macaroni tube, the tail of a lowercase digamma, the hook of a treble clef, an unbaited fishhook in briny waters, impression of a half-horseshoe on silt,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,

Liz Mbuthi Being Black Being black is such a beautiful thing, Being black is sometimes seen as everything Like when I go into a shop I’m seen as a black person, who is stereotyped to steal Or when I’m with other black friends, we are seen and stereotyped as a gang who are out to cause trouble. Being black means being taught to fear the police, never do anything to tick them off. Being black means trying to stay out of trouble because if you don’t the next thing you’ll see is breaking news headlines reading ‘Black man assaulted a police officer’. Being black means wearing protective hairstyles, such as box braids, all the time because your natural hair doesn’t fit in with the beauty standards. Being black means having to answer stupid questions like ‘can you speak African?’, or ‘I know someone from Africa, do you know them too?’. Being Black means having to work twice as hard as others. Being Black means always trying to stay calm because no one likes the ‘angry black girl’. God forbid I act out from all the pressure and boom, I’m classed as the ‘ghetto, ratchet, loud black girl’. But being black can also mean having barbecues with extended family, with cousins who aren’t technically your blood cousins. Being black means having aunties and uncles who expect us to remember them because we met them one time when we were 3 years old. Being black means having parties that can and will last up to three days max! Being black means having all of our mums being professional cooks when

it comes to our cultural food. Being black means wearing cultural clothing and jewellery when going to church every Sunday and listening to the pastor preach about disobedient kids and your mum giving you ‘the look’. Being black means nights with all of your cousins at your grandma’s house when our parents are having a night out together. Being black means having your parents blasting music in your own language or gospel music on a Saturday morning and you just knowing you are gonna spend the whole day cleaning the house. But most of all, Being black is who I am. Black is beautiful. If you don’t see my colour then you definitely don’t see me.

Logan Care Being COVID I’ve been trapped in this creature for as long as I can remember, Hoping to escape at least before September. At last, I’m swirled and stirred into soup, No longer acting like a chicken in a coop. First I’m in China, on the news, Soon I’m world-wide, with countries to choose. Everyone sitting in their homes feeling solemn, No one can stop me now, I’m in the unbeatable column. I’m infecting everyone, you may think I’m malicious, But you know me I’m fatal and vicious. Driving people into lockdown, to you it’s utter madness, To me it’s joy and glee, feeding off of people’s sadness. The world is retreating, they think they’re safe at last, But I’m still keeping you in my deadly clasp. I guess you’ve won this battle, but the war has yet to come, and soon, when I’m strong again, more deaths will sum.

Maddie Stoll Shorthand Portraits of my Brother My brother as an echo, out the car window he cries ‘yahoooo’, but it’s gone before it is heard. My brother as furrowed eyebrows flipping through a book. “The wonth, the twoth, the threeif ”, completely convinced. My brother by a photo finish on cold, grey days – he plays “races” against himself. He wins. Usually. My brother as a beacon. The waves will not stop, until they meet with the sky. You know – to say hello. My brother as a mise en abyme. He stands on the beach and looks out, his mind elsewhere. Sees infinity –

Madeleine Whitmore On Autumn as it all dies find me fashioning a love from pocket lint and blues / peach light flickering the dust from the sill as I’m tossed past the dead perennials and this epoch gives up the ghost / your deadleafed tracksuit bottoms cinch in at the ankles like daisy-centres as you ride through the mulch and / I twist my dyed hair, silvered with frost, around my fingers as it cuts the circulation / this month you swear your meaning lies in the gold leaf combed through the fields but the cider gleam on your lip suggests that you’ll revise this claim tomorrow / people’s eyes are so pretty, like how they sparkle like ice and silt and mackerel / glisten with wind-shot tears / I swill the heat round my cup / five kinds of Klimt’s gold reflected and glittering at me from the surface as / the breeze slaps my cheeks rhododendron red and / the willow sighs / crying / waiting for the musk of the months to leave.

Madhu K This is my land. Curry house but oust me from mine. Ego fragile like poppadoms, Paparazzi picking and mixing Jalebi lies and Bomb-ay mixture. It’s you and us. I am unwelcome on the queen’s soil But I’m not fond of her land, Of dry food and bland people. Change the lightbulb. Drive the taxi. Stock the newsagents. You want an army of palatable, chicken tikka rajs. But I’m not sorry. Karmas a bitch, And so are you. I want to stuff you with the truth until you barfi. Write it in henna Until your arms turn a dirty brown Or a fresh, bloody red. Until my spice sears your tongue, Or until you smell delightfully of thievery, murder and colonising soap.

Magenta Muir Firsts our first christmas passes. first birthday comes soon after. one too many glasses. one laugh missing in the laughter. it’s difficult doing the first this, the first that. but the second time’s difficult too. always an empty seat where you had sat. mum says it’s just different. it’s always different without you.

Maille Hennessy Online Lessons Online Lessons Another layer of lipstick is smothered across your teacher’s lips. She looks worried, almost nervous, but only for a second, Then a fake smile is plastered across her face. You can’t blame her, you are guilty of this action as well. You are in school, others are not. Sometimes you are glad to be them, other days are different. Your teacher turns on her mic and camera and calls out the role. Many of your classmates speak in quiet, muffled tones and refuse to show their faces. You can’t blame them, you are guilty of this action as well. Someone’s mic is left on, babies crying in the background. You don’t know if this was an accident or purposely done for entertainment. You can’t blame them, you are guilty of this action as well.

Marlo Cowan Functioning Our counselor messages us during the seminar on mental illness: Has your mental health been negatively affected by quarantine? I don’t message her back. That night, I dream that the last water buffalo is dying outside my house with its legs torn off. I don’t know how to tell her I don’t get panic attacks but my nails are so bitten they sink in bloody frames, and I forget my friends’ voices although we text daily. I maintain straight As despite three late assignments. I am functioning. There’s nothing else to do. Before this year, I’d never had a nightmare. In my next one, I break off an engagement I don’t want and my fiancé cries. In quarantine I discover my most niche fears. When teachers ask how I feel, I say ‘fine’ because there’s no concise way to say ‘Yes, of course I was stressed at first, but it’s like a baby crying on a plane: learning to drown it out makes the transition to hell easier.’ In this hell, I dream that everyone I know is mauled by wolves. I dream that Elton John and I stand knee-deep in water containing killer bacteria. The subconscious landscape shakes, collapses into a suburb where every street is the same and everyone is gone. I dream, twice, about being executed. This, I will admit to myself if not the counselor, is probably not normal. On nights I can’t sleep at all, I wonder how long it’d take to know if my family were the last ones left, and get out of bed at 2AM to frantically Google

if anyone remembered to tell the astronauts or the Amish. This is what functioning looks like. Next I dream I am eating lunch back at my old middle school. People are pressed on either side of me and nobody is wearing a mask. I look around and think, They don’t know yet. I’m the only one that knows. That one is the worst of all.

Megan Kidd Cupcakes In the bowl, flour pours Smooth and soft The mixture gathers I mix away as I hear her footsteps Getting closer, Closer as she came to see How I was doing with the baking She stood and watched As I whisked away, I began to struggle, but she was always there Ready to give me a helping hand The batter was ready, we smiled and laughed The cupcake tray was heavy, But we got to the oven, They start to rise and rise again By God, she could bake the best cakes, Just like my great grandma My great grandma always told me “A good book can help you cook” Always with the subtle little voice of hers She let me borrow her cook books all the time We would bake together, for my mum, And that’s what got me into baking

That luscious smell of freshly made cupcakes Filled us with joy, soft, bubbly cupcakes Of light, the heavenly taste of My great grandma’s sweet, luxurious Cupcakes In the bowl, flour pours Smooth and soft I’ll bake with it.

Merit Habib Matta Bilady become a flower of lost roots sunflower sun-bleached history bird’s nest hair, sun-rich skin a lion’s sky, an eagle’s ground the nile’s soil, as the desert surrounds dig my talons into this sand though i sit upon the petals and the roots are half the world below i won’t let go, i won’t let go seeds sowed by my ancestors buried deep ‘neath me meritamun, tutankhamun ramses ii, nefertiti they are like me bold-nosed, misplaced, held hostage in a museum in a place so far away from the motherland bilady, bilady, bilady

form a rope out of my heritage fibres of forgotten pride heave myself up, up, up out of this paradox this void of diaspora into the light, burning sky peer past the rain drenched mud look at the intricate tapestry that flows through the dirt that flows through the sand that flows through my past through me bilady.

Translation: Bilady= My Country in Arabic

Merrie LeMaitre 1st march 2021 nobody tells you the damage after the death. how i cried the day after she passed because the boy i liked didn’t respond to my text quick enough, drowned in guilt. i should’ve told my teachers that i didn’t hear a word of those zoom classes because i was writing ‘iceline’ over and over in every font i knew of, or just staring at the spot of mould on the wall. how i had the urge to cackle during the family zoom call to celebrate her birthday, because everyone’s eyes were so red and their mouths upside down U’s, then despised myself for weeks. i hated God for a solid month after, mistrustful because my friend’s sick grandma lived but mine didn’t yet i prayed just as much for both of them, angry that i begged so hard but He didn’t hear. nobody tells you how worried you get when you’re in the middle of doing something dumb like drunkenly pissing in Asda carpark at midnight or something else that’s less than holy and you suddenly remember that she could be watching this pathetic display somewhere, shaking her head and tapping her foot, wondering if it would be possible to late term abort your whole bloodline.

Miceala Morano burning haibun for a burning world mother earth calls her children, her hands a sea of flames. says the gasoline stove burned dinner. the power went out, flat lines melting into lustrous flames on the pavement. at the end of the world, mother wears her best dress, bilious pink, shade of polluted patagonia. the ocean blinks an eye of fire, so for dinner, scorched fish with throats enmeshed in plastic. the tv’s commercial drones on, promises that you too can go to hell. all you have to do is open your eyes. wake up. wake up. mother is on life support, pipes pulling oil from her chest, lungs blooming black smoke. all of us murderers in varying degrees, the heat index a thousand burning pages. as she reads, mother asks for cups of crushed ice, something to calm the fever to a humid hum. yes, mother, i know it’s warm. i know you’re dying. i know how this ends. your body a house you’ll burn in. you’ll die with no one left to declare the time. our bodies are flames, our lungs kissing smoke. mother calls her children gasoline flat lines wears her best fire you have to open your eyes. wake up. wake up. mother is on life support, her lungs burning ice mother, i know how this ends. you’ll burn flames kissing smoke. mother calls children, flat lines. open your eyes, wake, we know how this ends.

Milly Bell Blood Blood. that first spot stark on my white knickers, the steady flow pouring out for days, the last trickles coming to an end. those five days. full of Blood. thick Blood. thin Blood. red Blood. brown Blood. for five days i am swallowed into a world of capitalism and consumerism. cold, cruel companies that don’t care telling me what to do, what to eat, what to wear in order to be clean and dainty and ladylike and feminine. five days in which my body shouts and screams

and bleeds. during those five days they want me to be helpless, a helpless woman that they can prey on, take advantage of. but instead, i am fierce and clear-headed and determined, as the Blood cascades like a river from my uterus. a red, gushing fountain that ebbs and flows, comes and goes in scarlet crimson ruby waves. bringing every month for five days Blood.

Nicole Hur After the Funeral Grandmother recalls the chill, the sadness sweet on her tongue as she sips omija tea, dried magnolia berries blackening the water as children outside summon angels in the snow One universe peering into another, we sit behind the window watching children eat ice, acid rain on their tongues quiet as powdered sugar settling I felt it coming she whispers pressing her forehead onto the glass

Noah Emmens Achilles in the cave when we kiss, the shame covers me. my body, these scars are nothing compared to his goldenness. my anger rises as I feel his fingers on my body. the space where something should lie is empty. he has known, always known about me, always known about the girl I killed. my hands are stained with blood, his are clean. a golden boy. I am nothing compared to him. I am a half-devil of a boy, fraudulent & fake. & yet, his hands are holy & I arch into his touch. something in his breath makes me feel full; something is blossoming under my surface, & I’m terrified that I might be worth something after all.

Noah Rain Jones Tea I was walking with my mum When I asked her, “How was your day?” She said, “Abysmal.” I asked “Would you like me to make you a very beautiful cup of tea?” She smiled, “Yes! Yes please.” At first, I ran all the way to the far, far shelf, Pulled the sparkling white tea cup down, Then all of a sudden, I heard my mum, “Is the tea ready yet?” I shook my head. Next thing I did was pull out a grey sock-like tea bag. All of a sudden I heard my mum screeching, “Noah, is my tea ready yet?” I shook my head. I pressed a button and the water started to erupt like a volcano, Then I heard some shouting from the other room: “IS MY TEA READY YEEETTTT????” I said “Wait for a bit.” Next, I poured a bit of milk and pulled out a spoon. I spun the tea like a tornado, Then from in the room I was in, I heard the biggest scream, “IS THE TEA REEEAADDY YEEEETTT?!” I nodded my head. My mum took a little sip and her frown Turned to the brightest smile, ever. Her heart turned very warm.

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Reena Rajyaguru A Rose by Any Other Name Would Still Have Thorns Try to pronounce my name right. It’s not too hard, I promise. 4 syllables, phonetically read, Laced with centuries of history from India. Pearl merchants and jewellers take my name, Sugar cane farmers from Uganda, Ranis from Gujarat, Shrouded in silk saris, murmur words You wish you could comprehend. Try to pronounce my name right, I know you can if you choose to. Tchaikovsky and Dostoevsky Tumble from your mouth without trouble, So why is my name so hard? I will not say it the ‘white way’, Lessen myself to fit into your small mind. I will not commit an injustice against my ancestors To keep you comfortable. Try to pronounce my name right Because I will no longer laugh politely When you joke about its foreign length. Instead, my hard eyes will meet yours Engaging in a long-awaited standoff Which I am determined to win.

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Rena Su Reading tea leaves with my edgiest friends We’re all seventeenish; it’s hard to conjure up destiny. We don’t even like tea; lattes are better and chamomile is mediocre at best. Our chamomile is vaguely tainted by dish soap and we don feathery moustaches left over by cream cheese from breakfast bagels. It’s 3 in the afternoon but we make sure to use Lacey’s basement and leech out the sunlight. Each one of us is from the same Catholic school but we have tarot card tattoos on our ankles and listen to King Crimson. Olivia rants about the suffragettes of the 20th century and I can see the Susan B. Anthony poster plastered on the wall staring down at me as I ask, “Has it only been that long?” We joke to each other, wondering if we’d be burned at the stake if we were in Salem. We don’t come to a conclusion. I get a good sign from my teacup regarding my heart but I tell my girlfriends that I think love is dead; the boys in our grade download porn and rate all the girls on a Google Doc. I shrug and dispatch the tea down the drain, thinking that it looks a bit like piss.

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Robin Cox Jo Somewhere she is thinking through routes, instructing my dad as he circles the roundabout for the third time; encompassing his prey. She gathers a torn paper map. Aggressive police sirens pass. Spilled baby food across my lips. And the smooth, leather glove box remains open, ready to be fed. And here I am, fascinated by the bright lights on the midnight road. A half-empty creased water bottle crunches. The chill of the air-con overwhelms me as a set of brushed cotton pyjamas and a well-fastened seatbelt hold me captive. And she turns around, her eyes meet mine. She folds up the map and places it down. A hasty click of the glove box echoes the car silent. She leans towards me.

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RJ Danvers 8.55 You wake up, tired Just as you went to sleep – (Tired) You eat something that is not breakfast food. But it is food, and it is breakfast. You set up, Half asleep. You prepare to mute yourself. You were always quiet in class anyway. This is how you live. This is how you die.

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Rojay Peaches It rough being a mad man It’s rough being a mad man, Ya wouldn’t understand It rough being a mad man, Ya wouldn’t understand Some mi hungry till me want eat mi toe, A through, you na know, Some time mi hungry till me want eat mi toe A through you na know, a through you na know It rough being a mad man Ya wouldn’t understand 1984, the last man come and tell mi say mi look broke down Lord Jesus Christ, who ago help mi The Government gone and left mi to rot It rough being a mad man Ya wouldn’t understand It rough being a mad man Ya wouldn’t understand 1979, common entrance, just mash mi up and left mi to rot It rough being a mad man

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Ruby Corrigan Father like you Father where are you? I need you, I need you! Scared to contact? Fallen sick, or drinking a brew? Or prioritising your ‘other children’? But they’re not yours, I’m your only one. Father, pay attention! Please listen! What do I need to do? Play your favourite sport? Hurt myself? It’s your choice, your decision. Maybe you’re just ‘being a man’, Maybe you’re ‘too damaged’ to be involved, Maybe you have no idea how it feels to be the one never loved. But one thing that I know to be true Is not even for my worst enemy Would I wish they had a father like you.

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Sarah Fathima Mohammed Tangles Mother’s fingers, thin and godless, curl at the nape of my neck like tired children coming to the dinner table. Mouths full with grass and scuffed knees and spit. We are so tender, breaths full -bellied. Bed comforter embracing us as a whisper. The television static unhooks night into a remedy, drops the dark ink down our throats. Mother separating three strands at a time from the rough mass of my hair. Thick knots peeling into moonbeams. Breaking news / Dar-ul-Arqam mosque arson / arson spits from the television again. Screen shiny, white and sprayed clean. All dry throats and no light. This time, we learn the mosque was set on fire three blocks from our home. The children behind my shoulders shudder into flames. Bed comforter rough, tattered. Listen. My hair still holds tangles the size of scarred fists. Fists tired of fighting and dying all at once. Too sharp for Mother, her hand-lullabies. O, how the night grows restless from our tongues like a new pair of shackles.

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Sasha Carter The park bench on Springfield Hall football pitch 3 Most people know it as Springfield’s most oblivious monument, Erected to the hundreds of twelve year olds Old enough to scrawl 69,420, Young enough to find it hilarious. Documenting the almost Aristotelean love Of Steph and Danny. And Steph’s rage as she enshrines the truth: Danny is a f*cking c*cks*cker. The mythical yellow stain, The various artistic expressions of what could be a) Man with huge ox head drinks milk from glass JUUL b) T-Rex but with long fire hydrants instead of arms c) Bowl of spaghetti meatballs with oblong eyes [Only visible if looked at with a 45 degree angle and only at certain times of the day] I’m telling you This bench, right here, that’s what it’s all about.

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Sia Shekhar White Teeth John is sweet and John is funny and John is charismatic and John cares so much for the world and the state of the Earth and John is so sweet with his blue eyes and pristine white teeth and John is athletic and John loves talking to people even the ones no one pays attention and John sits so close I can smell his cologne and John is so thoughtful for forming his opinions based off of his white rightwing parents and John is cultured even though he mocks me for eating rice with my hands and John is always asking why I smell like curry and John’s standard outfit is a polo with khakis and John says he’s open-minded but thinks everyone should speak English and John thinks cricket is dumb because it looks easy and John says the Catholic church is the only church and makes fun of the Ganges for being dirty and asks how I consider it holy and John thinks there are too many gods in Hinduism and teachers think John is the greatest because he always has something meaningful to contribute to the conversation on racism and John thinks he’s not a racist because he doesn’t say the n-word and John likes the costume I wear for Diwali and John says he likes the good kind of Asians but not the brown kind and John promises to eradicate poverty in India for my family but my family is American and John says he wishes I had more of an ass and John says the darker the girl the sweeter the berry and John thinks forcing me to laugh at uncomfortable jokes makes him funny and John says I’m the prettiest Indian girl but not the prettiest girl and John calls himself respectful and John wishes there were more guys like him.

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Sinéad O’Reilly Classroom My chair at school feels like the Plastic bucket a crab shrivels into When plucked from its rock pool. My sister asked me once why I don’t smile on the street. God, I’m red as a crust left in the sun And my legs no better than barnacled Claws. My stomach swings high Over ripples of conversation. I feel Sick. I want to splice out of this shell But I’m afraid there’d be nothing left.

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Síomha Gallagher Charlton Just Breathe People always say ‘just breathe’ As if that will magically solve all my problems As if it’s the best advice anyone could ever give But can’t they see That’s what I’m trying to do I’m trying to breathe But when the weight of the world is on your shoulders It’s hard to not be out of puff And when every breath you take is full of pain and pollution It’s hard to just ‘stay calm’ And when there’s so many responsibilities pulling you down It’s hard not to be suffocated And when each and every decision you make is closely scrutinised It’s hard to just ‘be nice’ And when everything you wear is ‘too short, need to cover up’ It’s hard not to let your anger out, let yourself go And when you’re being oppressed, there’s a knee on your neck It’s hard to just breathe So believe me Believe me Believe I can’t breathe.

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Sophie White Big I was put in a body Far too big for me Much in the same way You buy oversized clothes In the hopes you’ll grow into them I don’t think I’ll ever grow into it My toes don’t quite reach the edges And I am mostly empty space I don’t think I’ll ever grow And so I fill my body with empty things Trinkets and toys In the same way A disappointed mother fills An empty trophy cabinet And sometimes the things shift When my body moves And I become aware of the gaping hole inside me Resting at the bottom of my stomach Reminding me of what I never was And never will be But I fear the day I grow into this body And I fear the day it grows into me

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Stas Forte Bright Hours home in the daytime is empty. it is lazy, tight around the lungs like a rubber band, poised between the grubby fingers of a 12-year-old boy. it is awkward: frozen in white hospital light and thin, hollow air that leaves you struggling for breath alone on the peak of a mountain. home is where you are not here. sometimes, it is heavy and rich, soaked in the soft gold of safety between pages and under thick, sweet lamplight. but mostly home is a car crash that is yet to happen – the static of the radio when you’ve driven far too far for the music to reach you anymore and is now the crumpling of metal inside me when i realise you are driving and we are barrelling straight towards a wall and i do not stop you i turn up the radio and that hollow, sparkling static fills my ears as i push your knee down on the pedal.

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Stefan A. Jinga The Expired Pie There once was a juicy pastry, that was so very tasty. My stomach started to really rumble. And that’s when the pie in my mouth started to crumble. It had a taste of sour cherry, and when I finished I felt so sleepy. I fell asleep to get some rest, but it really wasn’t my best. In the middle of the night I vomited, my stomach wasn’t committed. As I threw up on the floor my mum watched in awe. That’s why you don’t eat expired food. (A true story)

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Syazwani Saifudin Hear take me back to banana milk days i dont want to know that world history actually just means european history anyway before i knew what calculus was or how to write A+ essays i knew happiness didn’t only have to occur in that hypnagogic haze the avoid at all costs cracks in the pavement were ablaze the answer to atlantis and escalators to exoplanets were hidden in sunshine rays i miss floaties, flying, fruit juice boxes and fingers sticky with doughnut glaze being held rather than being held accountable on display remember when laughter was light and friendships were always can’t recall the last time a mirror gave me praise back when I didn’t know how freeways differed from highways i craved the snacks passed around during traffic delays i dont want creepy men glancing at me not me sideways let me cry without asking if its my menstrual phase take me back to banana milk days when I could scream and not be made to capitalise punctuate paraphrase

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Tamsin Meek Memories Stargazing across the mind’s heart, Young memories form a work of art. From the day Danny started to crawl, I was fresh into life and so small. A billion things new to my eyes, In only a week gone by, So roll around now, In this brand-new life. And I, Let out my, First words, stealing the names, Chattering like a bird. When I, Open my eyes, Every day to see the face of a mother, And carried downstairs to smile at my brother, And he smiles back. I’ve seen the ancient Stone Henge in a light flashing by, A memory light, many years old, kept safe in our sky, I’ve been to Lego Land and walked the mini world, Saw the other families, with their other boys and girls. Stargazing, stargazing, across my mind’s eye, See the world as I know it, but the world I see is high, Stargazing, stargazing, recalling the years ago, Having fun in the sunshine and having fun in snow.

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Sandcastles in Weston-super-Mare, swimming in the sea, Never mind if it’s too cold, I don’t mind the breeze. Building snowmen in the Park, giving him a face and name, Other children knock him down, they should feel ashamed. But these memories shine like today, These memories shine in every way, A life not over yet, a life still moving on, A life still full of joy, a life not nearly gone. These memories, further now, I wish I were there right now, These memories, stored in the photo album in my head, These memories are more than just said. Stargazing, stargazing, through the past to see A wonderful life I once have known, the best of me to be, Stargazing, stargazing, I will tell you right now, No one could feel better than this, no one could understand how. These memories shine like today, These memories shine in every way, A life not over yet, a life still moving on, A life still full of joy, a life not nearly gone. These memories stay inside this world, Memories of me playing with boys and girls, So set out to seek for more, Memories, this is what life is for, Stargazing for your memories, This is what life is for.

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Tane Kim I Miss Poetry i miss the punctuation marks the capitalized letters the way i wrote without trying to bend the rules and do something new i miss when i didn’t know the rules of self-expression and i miss their words how malleable mine were how i didn’t have an opinion to match how i had the courage to discover my voice how i wrote for myself how the worlds in the corners of my mind intersected – how they danced on the page like a combination of steps i had never seen before i miss not having a style i miss the constant clatter of the keyboard on rainy days when i felt safe as i inserted myself onto a blank google doc

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Tina Huang Mulan for Magnolia after Nancy Huang i. This is how my grandmother tells the story: Four centuries ago, nomadic women rode their husbands’ horses along the plains of Luoyang, bathed in waters rich with summer’s heat. Barefoot on the coast, Zhu Mulan twirled around a golden comb. A mei, she was folding clothes, her infant brother’s linen, when men of stone came to fetch her father of glass. You see, Mulan’s visions of her father on a battleground manifest in the nightmares of every wife, daughter, and sister. Remember, this is a ballad. Mulan knew her father kept the family sword right next to a jade vase. With the blade, she drew a magnolia, became a son, and put her golden comb in the cinch atop her ill father’s horse.

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Of the Xianbei people,

Mulan was a nomadic

woman Freest when riding through plains, Loveliest when

promising to marry Jin Yong,

Loneliest when fighting ten years against the Rouran. Before her last battle, Mulan switched her costume for a silk hanfu, dashed blush on her cheeks, and inspired the men of her army the way all generals do. The emperor called her China’s princess. She would have been lavished in gold, become the woman she never was. Instead, she rode back to a quiet village on a nameless horse and entered a house dusted by her father’s last breath. ii. This is how my mother tells the story: Mulan shares my maiden name that I never changed, the last name of my father. Not Hua, flower, but Zhu, meaning red, like cinnamon mixed in herbal drinks taken to fight an imbalance of yin and yang.

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Her father taught her how to fight. His body’s yang diluted his yin until no flavour remained. After the recruiters came, Mulan travelled east, bought a fine horse, and covered ten thousand li of battleground. When fighting the Rouran, Mulan sees herself in the breastplate of another nomad’s iron armour, her hands, which once folded clothes, now red and rough. In this version, she fights ten years and returns engaged. Jin Yong is a soldier. Mulan is a Xianbei nomad. The Rourans are nomads. iii. This is how I tell the story: Mulan isn’t a nomad, she is a tomboy surnamed Hua, flower, Mulan for magnolia. They call her Flower fucking Flower to please those who hate cinnamon. Her father’s face buffers on screen, a

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tanner hue than Mulan’s. Dragon’s scales are the only red. I see Jin Yong is Li Shang. From original to sequel, he goes from a one man army to unknown death. A li is a half-kilometer. Rourans are barbarians. Mulan, a symbol for justice, beauty, pride. Look at the apple; there’s always an apple. In middle country’s eyes, the Uighurs are the Rourans are the very thing they wanted Mulan to protect her father from, to save a homeland that didn’t need saving. iv. This is how Mulan tells the story: Four centuries ago, I was a woman born to forget the lyrics of this broken ballad.

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Tom Griffin Hammerhead I have a shark on my leg. It’s a hammerhead shark and They like to dine at dawn and dusk, They eat lobsters, tarpon, jacks, squids, Sardines, toadfishes, Groupers, porgies; But above all, Hammerheads just love To feed on rays: Cownose rays, Guitarfishes, Skates, Stingrays, Even eagle rays. It’s there forever I’m told, Sardonically, limpet-lipped, Which I already know and I’m Feeling a feverish urge To scratch it with a pen. What does it mean? I’m asked, so I smile and ask them Did you know Hammerheads use their wide heads To pin stingrays against the seafloor? Ceci n’est pas un Hammerhead Shark, I explain, tracing the grooves

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With my fingernails, wanting them To understand why it’s there, Instead of my proud mum Embroidered on my chest Or my grinning dad Carved into my arm. If you come too close My hammerhead shark Will eat you. I sleep and I feel It swimming up and down my spine, Wrapping around my neck, Shimmering across my back. It’s hungry but there are no rays Around, so it feeds on Me when people aren’t looking, Taking and only taking more. It’s there forever because I put it there.

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William Goltz Regular Season At Easter time he’ll stock the stream, Letting loose from plastic buckets The flailing fins of rainbow trout Born to swim in circles. He’ll cup a thermos to his hands And cough, to clear his tired lungs, As dirty fins in Home Depot Homes fall into the creek. He’ll note the way their bodies slide Across meniscus from the air that Bears the subtle scent of ashes Mingling with pond dye. Once more he’ll hoist the flimsy handle, Rattling beneath its plastic sheath As water sloshes, jumps to gain A free fall: A single fin is airborne now, A dorsal spine arcs to achieve Clearance of the see-through rim, A leap, a mighty leap is made and yet – Only the gravel awaits him now (Perhaps it’s her, you cannot tell), The beady eyes can only see, As they rock and jerk and crash Around the bowl that holds them fast, The ground in all its sturdiness, Where shining scales will writhe and scrape Until they can no more.

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Yong-Yu Huang Ghazal for the Body In Summer All summer, my forgetting mouth was against the window, a body gleaming like any bulbous fruit. The apples, full-bodied. Before the browning spots went soft, I swallowed six pills & fed the rest to the dogs, watched them paw at the dirt for bodies pretending to be weightless by the stagnant pond where I buried the bones. Later, their desperate bodies tore through the curtains, splitting the stillness of the room into pale halves: the flushed warmth of a body. I peeled back the skin to look for what remained: image in monochrome, hallowed bone. Filmy with whatever the body did not want, could not afford. When the nurses came, I asked for my name. Bruised language. Memory that fit into anybody transposed out of the ward’s silty heat. I couldn’t remember the colour of the dogs’ pelts or the way their bodies flickered outside the window. Instead, I carried fistfuls of fruit to my mouth, teeth purpling. Pressing until the body gave way – only light cutting through the ribs, every diagram a new loss to be mourned. I remember how, before the body

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forgot the word for reflection, for glass, I wandered into a hall of mirrors and stole any face that would fit this body, pocketed words to speak what I could not bear to leave unsaid. The space behind the eyes milky against the burnished body of the horizon. To forget what I know of sickness & replace it with shrivelling fruit. All summer, this unforgettable body.

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Yusra Motin Brown Expectations Learn how to make bhat properly, not in a rice cooker. Make sure the satni is not too bland for dadi, but don’t complain if you find it too spicy. Don’t show your shoulders or ankles, it’s traumatising the aunties. Don’t dress like that, you whore, you slag. So what if your cousin’s best friend’s sister is dressed like that? Why are you dressed like it’s your wedding? But don’t look like a fucking sandbag; have some honour, or you’ll bring your family dishonour. You wouldn’t want that now, would you beti? So what if you’re depressed? You’re just overreacting, that’s nothing compared to what I’ve been through, Amma – a modern woman – always says. Are you called a Paki? Are you beaten up by your Babaji? No, so stop complaining.

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Zara Tosun Useless instruction manual on how to grieve for mum

• Sit next to a freezer and cry because you aren’t hungry. • One hour earlier, sit at a desk and cry because she promised you she would come home on Wednesday. • Cry because she died on Saturday. • Cry because that was years ago. • A little while after that, hunch limply over a sink and realise that, since she died in her sleep with really no warning, she would have drifted off alone in a hospital bed. • Cry because of this, and grip the porcelain to further make your point. • Cry all over a toothbrush because they didn’t tell you she was gone until the next afternoon. • Set the shower to your desired temperature. • Laugh bitterly like some wounded stereotype as you remember the excuses they have come up with for not telling you. • Cry with renewed vigour because you aren’t being fair to them, and then because none of this is fair on you, and then laugh some more because all of this is just unfair in every way and crying won’t change anything. • Cry anyway. • For advanced practitioners, sitting in the foetal position can add dramatic flair. • Exit the shower, and cry again because they didn’t tell you she was gone until the next afternoon, except this time cry so hard you have to sit on the floor because you think your chest is about to cave in. • Cry because you are hungry now, but don’t have the energy to make food.

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• Cry because you are so, so tired of crying. • Cry because you wish you could have been there to say goodbye or maybe something less final like goodnight, see you tomorrow, I love you. • Cry because you loved her, and cry because you always will. • Think: Perhaps you fell asleep together. Perhaps she gave you a goodnight kiss on her way to wherever she was going. • Cry at the thought. • Write poetry about grief until it no longer feels like it’s all you will ever know. •Repeat.

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Zoë Legge Aesthetic fire in my lungs wheels hitting tarmac paint cans that go rattle-rattle-rattle performative friendship vodka stolen and borrowed ‘unpopular’, but never alone a transparent crowd am i cool yet?

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Foyle Young Poets of the Year 2021 Top 15 winners: Ahana Banerji • Alex Dunton • Anja Livesey • Briancia Mullings • chenrui • Daniel Wale • Dhruti Halambi • Erin Hateley • Evie Alam • Giovanni Rose • Hollie Fovargue • Jenna Hunt • Lulu Marken • Sarisha Mehta • Ran Zhao The commended poets: Abi Vance • Aditi Banerjee • Adrienne Knight • Alana Hussein • Alex Heather • Alex Sayette • Alexander Brown • Anandini Sengupta • Anna Heezen • Anna Jones • Aratrika Lahiri • Bea Unwin • Boudicca Eades • Caitlin Pyper • Dorothea Davies • Duaa Waseem • Ela Briant • Ela Rifat • Ella Quarmby • Elise Withey • Ellory Hogton • Ellyson Haynes • Emma Picolo • Eva Westenberger • Eve Hannon • Finn Parkinson • Freya Cook • Freya Leech • Freyja HarrisonWood • Grace Marie Liu • Ingrid Fellah • Isabel Lyle • Ishani Pandey • Jacob Keneson • Jazmine Brett • Jess Sutton • Jessica Kim • Jilin Yan • Kirsten Allen • Kyo Lee • Lauren Lisk • Lillian Yanagimoto • Lin Zhao • Liv Goldreich • Liz Mbuthi • Logan Care • Maddie Stoll • Madeleine Whitmore • Madhu Kannan • Magenta Muir • Maille Hennessy • Manon Memmi Weir • Marlo Cowan • Megan Kidd • Meredith LeMaître Nugent • Merit Habib Matta • Miceala Morano • Milly Bell • Nicole Hur • Noah Emmens • Noah Jones • RJ Danvers • Reena Rajyaguru • Rena Su • Robin Cox • Rojay Peaches • Ruby Corrigan • Sarah Mohammed • Sasha Carter • Sia Shekhar • Sinéad O’Reilly • Síomha Gallagher Charlton • Sophie White • Stas Forte • Stefan Jinga • Syazwani Saifudin • Tane Kim • Tasmin Meek • Thomas Griffin • Tina Huang • William Goltz • Yong-Yu Huang • Yusra Motin • Zara Tosun • Zoë Legge Read the winning and commended poems online. The anthologies of winning and commended Foyle Young Poets of the Year 2021 are available at bit.ly/foyleyoungpoets

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The Poetry Society The Poetry Society is the leading poetry organisation in the UK. For over 100 years we’ve been a lively and passionate source of energy and ideas, opening up and promoting poetry to an ever-growing community of people. We run acclaimed international poetry competitions for adults and young people and publish The Poetry Review, one of the most influential poetry magazines in the English-speaking world. With innovative education and commissioning programmes, and a packed calendar of performances and readings, The Poetry Society champions poetry for all ages. The Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award is at the core of The Poetry Society’s extensive education programme, and it plays an influential role in shaping contemporary British poetry. We’d like to congratulate all our former winners on their recent achievements. Here’s just a taste: Lauren Hollingsworth-Smith’s debut pamphlet Ugly Bird and Georgie Woodhead’s debut pamphlet Takeway will be published this year by The Poetry Business (Smith|Doorstop); Cia Mangat featured on Cerys Matthews’ album We Come From the Sun; Mukahang Limbu and Yasmin Inkersole were longlisted for the 2020 National Poetry Competition; Annie Fan’s debut pamphlet Woundsong has been published by Verve; Laura Potts was shortlisted for the Manchester Poetry Prize; A.K. Blakemore’s debut novel The Manningtree Witches (Granta, 2021) won the Desmond Elliott Prize 2021; Jade Cuttle is a winner of a Northern Debut Award for Poetry; Phoebe Walker and Dominic Hand won Eric Gregory Awards. poetrysociety.org.uk

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The Foyle Foundation The Foyle Foundation is an independent grant making trust supporting UK charities which, since its formation in 2001, has become a major funder of the Arts and Learning. The Foyle Foundation has invested in the Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award since 2001, one of its longest partnerships. During this time it has trebled its support and enabled the competition to develop and grow to become one of the premier literary awards in the country. foylefoundation.org.uk

Help young writers thrive The Poetry Society’s work with young people and schools across the UK changes the lives of readers, writers and performers of poetry, developing confidence and literacy skills, encouraging self-expression and opening up new life opportunities. Support us by donating at poetrysociety.org.uk/donate

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Foyle Patrons This year we were pleased to collaborate with Arlo Parks and Ben Bailey Smith as Foyle Patrons. We are very grateful to Arlo and Ben for all their support with the award. A poet and musician from London, Arlo won the 2021 Mercury Prize for her debut album, Collapsed In Sunbeams, and Breakthrough Artist at the 2021 Brit Awards. Ben is a writer, actor, comedian and musician who began his career in rap, and has since gone on to star in Law and Order, The Inbetweeners, Miranda, Brief Encounters and more. His children’s books, I am Bear and Bear Moves, have been critically acclaimed. Arlo said: “It’s an honour to be a Patron for the Foyle Young Poets Award this year. Poetry for me was always a safe space with no rules where I could trust my intuition and describe the world through my singular lens. It’s often seen as an art form that is inaccessible or opaque and that’s why I’m so excited to be a part of these awards. These awards are an opportunity to bring young people to poetry, allowing them to flex their creative muscles and be completely themselves.” Ben expressed similar sentiments: “The first book of poetry I remember loving was Brian Patten’s Gargling with Jelly. I was about seven years old and I carried [it] everywhere, to the point that pages started to fall out. [...] It’s only now that I look back and think that was maybe the first time I grasped the understanding that words – simply organised in a funny, memorable way – could have profound power, could bring profound joy. Poetry has stayed with me ever since and now I write my own poems for children, not even for work but for fun! To be a patron of the Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award is a true honour, and to help kids find inspiration and confidence in their own writing ability brings me huge satisfaction.”

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What next? Young Poets Network is The Poetry Society’s online platform for young poets worldwide up to the age of 25. It’s for everyone interested in poets and poetry – whether you’ve just started out, or you’re a seasoned reader and writer. You’ll find features, challenges and competitions to inspire your own writing, as well as new writing from young poets, and advice and guidance from the rising and established stars of the poetry scene. Young Poets Network also offers a list of competitions, magazines and writing groups which particularly welcome young writers. This year, we’ve celebrated ten years of Young Poets Network, featuring some of the young writers who’ve risen through the Network, their poems and their top tips. We’ve also published articles about how to get a career in the arts, how to write a poet’s biography, your LGBTQ+ poet heroes and more. In our writing challenges, we’ve invited young people to collaborate with one another, translate poetry from an endangered language, and write about the body, popular culture and the climate. Each August, we ask four Foyle Young Poets to set and judge new writing challenges – so look out for these brilliant poets making their judging debuts! For updates about poets, poetry, competitions, events and more, like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter @youngpoetsnet and Instagram @thepoetrysociety youngpoetsnetwork.org.uk

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Schools and The Poetry Society Foyle Young Poets Award teaching resources, including lesson plans and online versions of the winning and commended Foyle Young Poets anthologies, are available on our website at poetrysociety.org.uk/ fypresources Poetryclass lesson plans and activities, covering all Key Stages and exploring many themes and forms of poetry, are easy to search and free to download. Each resource has been created by our team of poeteducators and teachers, with hands-on experience of developing an enthusiasm for poetry in the classroom. Find Poetryclass on our dedicated site: resources.poetrysociety.org.uk Poets in Schools help develop an understanding of and enthusiasm for poetry across all Key Stages. Whether you are looking for a one-off workshop or a long-term residency, an INSET session for staff or a poet-led assembly, The Poetry Society will find the right poet for you. Online and in-person options available. poetrysociety.org.uk/education School Membership connects your school with all that poetry has to offer. School members receive books, resources, posters, Poetry News and The Poetry Review (secondary only), as well as free access to our Poets in Schools service. poetrysociety.org.uk/membership Follow us on Twitter @PoetryEducation or sign up to our schools e-bulletin by emailing educationadmin@poetrysociety.org.uk

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Enter the Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award 2022 Judges: Anthony Anaxagorou and Mona Arshi Enter your poems – change your life! The Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award 2022 is open to any writer aged 11 to 17 (inclusive) until the closing date of 31 July 2022. The competition is completely free to enter and poems can be on any theme or subject. Prizes include poetry goodies, mentoring, places on a week-long Arvon writing course, publication in a prestigious anthology, and much more. Winners also benefit from ongoing support and encouragement from The Poetry Society via publication, performance and internship opportunities. How to enter: please read the updated competition rules, published in full at foyleyoungpoets.org. You can send us your poems online through our website, or by post. If you are aged 11 or 12 you will need permission from a parent or guardian to enter. You can enter more than one poem, but please concentrate on drafting and redrafting your poems – quality is more important than quantity. Entries cannot be returned under any circumstances so please keep copies. For more information, visit the rules section at foyleyoungpoets.org School entries: teachers can enter sets of poems by post or online using our simple submission form. Every school that enters 25 students or more will receive a £50 discount on our Poets in Schools service. Want a FREE set of anthologies, resources and posters for your class? Email your name, address and request to fyp@poetrysociety.org.uk For full rules and instructions, visit foyleyoungpoets.org

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Now YOU can be part of the Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award Send us your poems by 31 July 2022 and next year YOUR work could be read by thousands of people all over the world in an anthology like this one. Enter online for free at foyleyoungpoets.org Remember, you must be aged between 11 and 17 on the closing date of 31 July 2022. Good luck – we can’t wait to read your poems!

“The voices of this year’s winners will ring out, clear and urgent, over the coming years.” – Clare Pollard and Yomi S· ode, Judges of the Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award 2021

foyleyoungpoets.org