Passive Aggression in an English Office Kitchen

This is absolutely not a true story. Honestly. 


Passive Aggression in an English Office Kitchen

Day 1:
All the bloody milk's gone again, says A
We had 6 pints this morning, says B
It's people having their breakfast, (A again)
They should have it at home

Day 2:
It's 8.30am and I'm making a coffee
C comes in - mutual Hi's but I notice
she's carrying a packet of Weetabix;
my eyes narrow in suspicion

Day 3:
All the bloody milk's gone again, says A
It's only 3 o'clock
B shrugs - Shall I put a note up
Best not, says A, not worth the hassle

Day 4:
A has a point, for there has been a note
reminding people to put their dirty dishes
in the dishwasher, not the sink. It is in large red letters,
capitals. SHOUTING, but impersonal and ignored.
It is torn

Day 5:
8.42am A catches C eating Weetabix in the communal room
Milk dribbling down their chin and spilt on the table.
He says nothing - his mouth is tight shut. No Hi! today.
She puts it in the sink and leaves it.
3pm - All the bloody milk's gone again, says A

Tim Fellows 2017

Killing Machine

My poem, followed by one written by my dad 40 years ago


Killing Machine

The pavement is wet -
puddles lie in its uneven surface.
Head bent against the
northerly wind
I catch the reflection of a
streetlamp in one of them.

Its not too bad a thing
to be your last image -
although a nice sunset or
apple blossom on a spring tree
would be better.

I didn't see it, behind me
on the pavement,
traction lost on slick
road by worn rubber -
a moment's misfortune.

It is a strange thing,
I thought at the end,
to end up as another
statistic; one more victim
of the killing machine.

(c) Tim Fellows 2017

Motorway waterway

JE Fellows

The Decoy Bird

This was created in basic narrative form at a storytelling workshop at Towersey Festival led by the brilliant Debs Newbold and refined into a poem later. I've recently been reading Charles Causley and there are some nods to him in here too.

The Decoy Bird

Soldiers were coming - from the West
Nowhere had we to hide
except an oak tree or a ditch
there was no time to decide.
The leafy tree grew high and broad
so we began to climb
when a bird appeared, so very strange,
with plumage so sublime.

It shimmered blue, its crest was green;
night black its pointed beak;
it opened up its golden wings
and then began to speak:
"This tree not safe, come not in here,
your steps you must retrace!"
and so the dank foul smelling trench
became our hiding place.

The soldiers came, their crunching boots
stopped by the old oak tree;
We thought that they must surely find
my cousin Jack and me.
When suddenly a shout rang out
and then a gunshot too;
I saw when glancing at the sky
a flash of glistening blue.

The bird was dead, the soldiers laughed
and carried it away
But what they saw was not so strange
on that enchanted day;
They just saw a plain game bird
not sparkling in the sun
They left our land, we left the dyke
and to our home did run.

Years passed by but I ne'er forgot
the exquisite Decoy Bird
who saved our lives and died for us
yet we never said a word.
And now I'm old, my time is up
I wait to breathe my last
My mind is filled with memories
of my forgotten past...

An image flashed across my sight
from when I was a child
A fallen bird on the garden path -
my tired old face just smiled
I'd put that bird back in its nest
though I could not have seen
Its blackened beak, its aurate wings;
its crest of radiant green

I closed my eyes one final time
one crowning shallow breath
The long hid mystery was now solved
so thus I met with death.
But as my soul rose to the sky
I saw my golden wings
I opened up my jet-dark beak
and I began to sing.

"At last my story can be heard
for I'm the angelic Decoy Bird."

(c) Tim Fellows 2017

The Ghost Of Emily Wilding Davison.....

The Ghost Of Emily Wilding Davison Goes to Chesterfield Bowling Club on Hearing That They Have Voted to Not Admit Women

 BBC report
 
The outraged, resolute phantom
descended on the town.
Made a beeline for the Bowls Club
and flattened down their crown

She glided round the trim green lawn
diverting all the bowls.
She took a trip to the countryside
and brought back fourteen moles

She flew into the clubhouse
and put laxative in the beer.
She listened to the members chat;
wondering what they could fear.

About a missing chromosome
and the ability to give birth?
She'd died a hundred years before
to allow women to prove their worth.

As she sat there eavesdropping
she stopped being quite so mad.
And just felt pity there instead
because they were merely.. sad.

She allowed herself a giggle
at the panic it would bring
if a transgender bowler
applied to join their gang.

They'd all join her soon enough,
those cantankerous old men.
And their grandsons would vote for
not just old cocks, but hens

So she gathered up the fourteen moles
and restored their grassy crown.
But before she left she made sure
she put the loo seats down.

Emily Davison, suffragette

Winter's Journey

This poem started as an exercise from a poetry workshop in Rossington on 12th July 2017. It is based on words taken from the poem "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening" by Robert Frost

I woke up from my darkest sleep
My skin by downy quilt caressed
A frozen landscape from my window sweeps
to the snow-covered woods so dark and deep

The stony lane banks round the bend
The house retreats as I move on
Fear and uncertainty I must forfend
As on my thoughtful, passive way I wend

Far distant bells toll on the wind
The grey, damp church cold comfort now
Where once my hopes and dreams were pinned
A melodious hint for those who've sinned

What is the course that I intend?
No stopping now, no going back
After the village lonely miles extend
The journey starts, or does it end?


First undrafted version

I woke up from my darkest sleep
My face caressed by downy pillow
A lovely frozen landscape from my window sweeps
to the snow-covered woods so dark and deep
The journey starts, or does it end?

Charles Causley - a Cornish poet

Charles Causley CBE, FRSL was born in Launceston, Cornwall 100 years ago on August 24th 1917 and died on November 4th 2003. He was a writer, poet and teacher.

Although popular as a children's writer, the accessible nature of a lot of his poetry means that it is hard to distinguish between his children's poems and those for adults. His guiding principle can best be summed up by; "while there are some good poems which are only for adults, because they pre-suppose adult experience in their readers, there are no good poems which are only for children." This shows a great respect for, and lack of condescension towards, children that in my opinion would have made him a very good teacher. 

He is perhaps best known for his poem "Timothy Winters", a sharply observed piece with some startling imagery that must resonate strongly with anyone who has taught at primary schools. Whether every class has a Timothy Winters in it or not, every school that is within striking distance of a working class neighbourhood almost certainly will.

He was very well loved and respected in the poetry community - his closest friend in that world, maybe surprisingly, was Ted Hughes - and he was considered by all who met him to be a gentle, kind man who, although private, would happily discuss poetry, life, books and teaching with friends. His work was not really received as well academically as perhaps it deserved but in recent years this is changing and he is starting to become the subject of an increasing number of academic papers, publications and dissertations either as the sole subject or alongside contemporaries such as Philip Larkin and RS Thomas. Hughes and Larkin suggested his appointment as Poet Laureate which could have happened after John Betjeman died in 1994 - maybe he was considered too old or not heavyweight enough and in fact Hughes was given the honour. 

He served in the Navy in World War 2 and wrote poems of his experiences there that would also have been influenced by the fact that his father was killed as a result of ill health caused during the first war. The poem "Convoy" is a stunning short piece about a fellow sailor who was killed in battle. "Angel Hill", one of my personal favourites, is a very strange and unsettling piece about a return from war of two sailors.

Much of his work is influenced by his native county, where he lived all his life, and by the local folk music tradition. His house in Launceston, Cyprus Well, is owned by the Charles Causley Trust, a registered charity, that exists to celebrate his life and work and promote new literature activity in the community and region in which he lived. It is open to the public on request at limited times and is used as a venue for poetry readings and celebrations, not least of which is an annual festival celebrating his life and work.

His work has been picked up by a distant relative, folk singer and Devonian Jim Causley. His 2013 CD "Cyprus Well", sets some of his poems to music and he followed this up in 2016 with a CD of his children's poems "I Am The Song".

One of his final works, Eden Rock, has clear echoes of some of Thomas Hardy's work. It deals with life, nostalgia and death in 20 beautifully crafted lines and ends with a single line of such brilliance and simplicity that you almost want to give up writing yourself.

References:

The Charles Causley Trust and Cyprus Well

Obituary by his friend Susan Hill, November 2003

Charles Causley reads Eden Rock

Jim Causley's website

The Long-Leggedy Man

The Long-Leggedy Man

There is a man who stands so tall
I don't know how he walks at all

He wears blue clothes and a smart red hat
I don't know how he walks like that

He says hello and lifts his trilby
And says "good day" to the folks of Balby

He has long legs but tiny feet
How he gets around has got me beat!

It would be great to be that high
Up there with the birds that fly

Around your head and your waving flags
As tiny kids run between your legs

Long-leggedy man,  this poem's for you
the one who walks like we can't do

(c) Tim Fellows 2017