RAINBOW
Cosmo Goldsmith

I emerge in a shimmering maze of shifting colours when sun and rain make play. I blaze I arch I curve like a bow I am full of contradictions I am taut-stringed with tensions yet tinged with tenderness. I uplift and exalt the heavens I bridge the chasms between sky and earth I am a promise fulfilled and shaped by a god who has softened from vengeful rage to a being of compassion, perhaps even regret, for his acts of severity.

I am the heart-chord earth-core sky-high gleam of hope that follows in the wake of destruction and slaughter, all my shades and tones of colour keep mingling and merging, sharpening and softening, suffusing across the spreading landscapes of people’s dreams. I am full of contradictions. I am bold and light-filled and ostentatious yet also transient and elusive for I can vanish and fade into the blurring veil of clouds in the flick of a moment like a magician’s disappearing trick.

I am the ship that carries the hopes of renewal for the young and idealistic, the eco-green warrior dreamers that sail the frozen seas and follow the whale roads and the creatures of the deep.

I am the flagbearer, the coat of many colours, the herald and the champion of those who feel different and isolated for I revel in the richness and strangeness of our neuro-diverse world.

The twenty first century is not a friend of unity
Chris Hunter

The twenty first century is not a friend of unity.
It wants you separated, identified and alone.
You must buy stuff you don’t need and then buy more.
You will contradict what you know to be true.
You will value only the views of the celebrity.
You will consume pornography within your cancel culture .

The twenty first century is not a friend of unity.
It needs you silenced, compliant and afraid.
You must watch only these news providers.
You must deny climate change and fly frequently.
You will fight over the last pack of toilet paper.
You will be judged on your kitchen and latest phone.

The twenty first century is not a friend of unity.
It needs you marginalised, impotent and without a voice.
You must vote but the present course is set in stone.
You can protest, but only here and between these hours.
You will die but never speak of it before you do.
You will judge the thief through a cocaine high.

The twenty first century is not a friend of unity.
It needs you to hate, blame and die at its convenience.
You can grow old but must not be a burden.
You will believe the ignorant and ignore the science.
You will blame the weak and uphold the rich.
You will value life only in all that is consumed.

The twenty first century is not a friend of unity,
But unity needs no such friends.

Forty years on 
Liz Kendall

She’s a goer, our Margaret;
I want to be her when I grow up:
announcing my eighties with sex appeal and sloe gin.
Her younger man lives at a distance
too far to just drop in;
no such audacity –
make an appointment!

I covet her striped skirt,
flaring blush to wine
to maroon to black grape.
Peach scarf tied at her throat
like a debutante.

Her vibrant ensembles the right side of taste,
unlike her jokes, which are
joyful and wild and true. She’ll say it,
and make sure you hear, leaning in
to catch your eye, claim your attention.

That is not my style,
but perhaps I can practice;
little by little, one wink at a time.
If I start now and don’t give up drinking,
or dancing, or sex, or bright colours;
if I don’t lose interest in my changing self.

What springs of delight we are, we women;
how our bliss bubbles up, percolating,
getting better and richer with time.
We know our own deliciousness;
we have the first taste,
then add cream, and a dash
of our own hand-bottled booze.

Sword Dance, Woodland Stage
Liz Kendall

Layered under tradition in heavy skirts:
twenty-five yards of silk glorious and awkward,
filling the well of the driver’s side,
spilling to hug the gearstick and handbrake
as made-up eyes startle themselves in the rearview mirror.
Costumes are a rope bridge between fear and action
and there are always loose threads.

Together, we step onstage and leave no sister behind
until each pair of hands above their slowly rounding hips
maya maya maya maya
lowers one solid sword onto her solitary head.
Feeling the weight which wants to fall
just softly turning its curious flat-sided face:
catching the leaves’ glances, reflecting them back to the trees,
inviting light colours clouds; caught and cast.
Our swords fill up with sky as we worship below them.
As we hope for grace.

Smile: it’s a prayer.
Smile as the smooth snaky arms undulations.
Smile as the sharp level drop hip rotations.
Smile chest circles crests rolls like a wave
past the soft belly skin to the coin-heavy belt.
Ocean-travelled silk worn before torn before reborn:
hot colours stitched with gold. We hold each other tight
with our will and our bare feet following.
We will not let a sister or one single bright sword fall.

We celebrate with sugar and with laughter,
picking out a patch of grass; shaded, but not yet damp.

One good foot
Richard Lister

Most residents sit disconnected
as I wheel Mum towards the garden,
others watch TV on Volume 10
and only Dave’s room spills chatter.

A photo shows him in the amber
of a cycling team, still wiry fit at 60.
Ten years later and his right arm and leg
are listless, face half crumpled.

His words fumble so I lean close.
They were born last week,
three budgie chicks tumbled in down,
painted adults sing nearby.

Three weeks later, when Mum is dying,
I just discern How is your mother?
and see his cobalt eyes are moist.
Dave squeezes my arm.

He moves his wheelchair slowly but when
Douglas, who’s 102, needs help,
Dave pushes them both
with his one good foot.

ONE
Chandra McGowan 

Together here safe
Swim with love against the tide
Touching the heart space

Shared Disbelief
Lucie Rhoades

I don’t think I can do this anymore
as my body convulses and contorts and contracts,
and I let out what can only be described as a primal roar.

I know this is in my design but I don’t know what to do,
I can’t find the strength, I’m exhausted.
I keep thinking I’ll get there, I’ll pull through.

But, at this moment, I’m not sure how.
I’m trying to move with the ripples of hurt
but deep below I hold such self-doubt.

I think of those who have come before me on this path,
the friends, my sister, my mother,
and I wonder if I have that resilience too to last.

Somehow I find myself grasping a connective energy that joins us all,
one that pulses through motherhood
and catches us when we stumble, when we fall.

I come back to my breath and the room that I’m in.
Inhale, exhale, let the power of pain flow.
I can’t wait to meet you, now, let’s begin.

THREE YEARS ON
Kate Young

The sky split wide with sound at dawn,
The twenty-fourth of February –
The land scarred swiftly as bombs fell.

It’s been three years since war began,
Already many foreigners forget –
But Ukrainians will not.

Millions of Ukrainians uprooted,
Thousands of civilians killed or injured,
Nearly seven hundred children dead.

Ukraine has lost swathes of land
In south-eastern regions,
Many simply fled their homes.

Displaced Ukrainians carve
New lives in European countries,
Or elsewhere in the motherland.

The Russians may take our homes,
But they will never take our souls,
We stand together in unity.

We stand for justice and freedom,
We stand for hope, and the right
To simply be Ukrainian.

Picture: Taeshin T. on Unsplash