By Steve Hunt
Location: Strangeways
Smoke plumes from the pepperpot
I never noticed that before
I thought they hanged men there
A beacon to warn us of the enemy within
They could not keep the fires burning
As the deadman walked the sooty steps
The hangman would choke
But the smell reminds us
That the Devil waits beneath the trap
And the ascent to the drop
From the highest point here
Conspires with cathedral spire
To scrape the sky
And glimpse the face of a God so near
If only we’d mend our strangeways
Steve Hunt is North Mancunian born and bred. Sometimes he writes, sometimes he reads, sometimes he makes pictures.
By David Stedman
Location: 31 Landcross Road, Fallowfield
Midsummer, 9am,
bristled bees argue
with window glass,
seeking escape,
the first heat of day.
The radio talks on,
too loud, exhaling
the feel-good,
vapid words feathering
across a continuum of
dyed hair, cigarette ends,
dog barks, tabloid screeds,
grass-cool alleyways.
Buried in the back streets,
history matures in
rubber-mouthed jars, dusted,
derelict, boiling with ants,
mouldering flowers,
and down this path you disappear,
seeking to feel without
the complication of thought.
David Stedman studied English language and literature at the University of Manchester and enjoys every return visit to the city
By Linda Cosgriff
Location: Laburnum Way, Cheadle Heath
Mother shrieks at daughter,
‘Be ladylike!’
Old lady on daily Bingo trek
stumbles over
delinquent pavement;
no-one heeds her screams.
Teenagers screech
past on stolen motorbikes:
no helmets. If brains
strike pavement,
will it matter?
I see my world and
weep at the
stench of
hope gone
awry.
Linda Cosgriff is a wife, mother and Open University graduate. She hopes to start an MA in creative writing in 2010. She wrote this poem during the Rainy City Stories writing workshop at Stockport Art Gallery
By Natalie Basnett
Location: Philip’s Park, Clayton, Manchester
At first it was exciting, so much to look at, so much to talk about. It was on this daily walk that at seventeen and nineteen they had planned out their life together, wandering aimlessly through nooks and crannies, only their conversations leading the way.
But now they were accustomed to this walk, first among the grave stones and beneath the boughs of the bare willow tree and then over the bridge by the wood ear and on to the paths that were now covered with decomposing leaves.
He didn’t need to mention the slim trees that sprouted so close to one another they hugged, he looked in their direction and her eyes followed knowingly. She no longer stopped abruptly begging him to ‘wait, wait a moment and listen’ to the water carousing by, she merely slowed her pace and paused and his ears pricked up to hear what might once have been a body, disinterred from its grave, being swept downstream.
They shuddered now, recomposed and commenced their walk into Tulip Valley. From here they could see the great dome that rose and fell in the distance. They marvelled at it and wondered if it was warm and firm, like a great big belly. They each placed their hands across their own and breathed deeply.
She caught a glimpse of the magpies; she wished she carried his child. She had held her stomach longer than was usual, he was thinking it now too. He longed for his seed to grow in her. He shifted through her in the dark at night; it was comforting to know that they both wanted this.
Then each month the blood emptied from her. They knew the words by heart: it would happen, they would try again when it was over.
They walked at an easy pace on to the embankment by the trees. He observed a brown leaf that had curled in to a tight cocoon. It hung alone. He wanted to be inside it, encased in its soft papery skin. She saw him looking. ‘What is it?’ she asked, inviting him out of the silence with which it had momentarily provided. He gestured toward it and his sad brown eyes hung there for a moment longer. She peered at it and then gently took his hand, leading him away. They crossed over the green boggy land and left by the usual gate.
By Carole Ogden
Location: Oldham Road, near Wing Yip
A girl in a bluebottle coat scuttles by,
Head down, rushing into town.
She has shiny hair, shuttered eyes and sensible shoes:
a girl whose parents would be proud.
A man in a plasticine hat appears,
wearing a tie he borrowed from a friend.
Loud, tired and cheap, he will keep it
long after the end of the friendship.
By the frown of a streetlight,
Mr Oversight sings his swansong.
Shuffling along and tapping his toes
to a tune only he knows,
Clicking his over-long fingers.
On the other side of the road
stands the nuclear family,
using mobile ‘phones to keep in touch.
They send each other photos
of their smiling faces.
Rain soaks, like a memory,
into the skins of the paper children,
huddling against tall walls.
Unnoticed, they slip, once more,
back between the cracks in the road.
The world passes by
under the influence of billboards
and naked ladies kissing.
Carole Ogden lives in Bolton and was a Poem for Manchester finalist about five years ago. She is currently working in reader development and trying to get back into writing. About this poem, she says: ‘I used to travel regularly down the Oldham Road where I saw billboards with the poem title on – was quite intrigued!’
