Rules, I hate them
and they should die.

Kati Mohr

* https://www.houseofstaunton.com/special-moves

I’m waiting. No post for a day or two so perhaps there’ll be something.  I’m not expecting much but you never know. I’ve heard of letters arriving decades after they were posted. The road remains blank as an unwritten page. Just a pale space between ruled dark lines . Then suddenly it comes past the window before you can say Miss B with her blackboard rubber. One of those slates where the chalk makes a sound that can put your teeth on edge. She was writing some sums and the next moment she was there by the window pointing. It all  comes back like one of those missives arriving from over the years as clear as black and white.

first swift
a high pitched squeak
lost on the wind

Diana Webb

Outside yet inside the place for supplies, it offered the food of a different nature. I circle-danced round it at sight of a celandine, the season’s first bluebell in chimes of assent through the soil beneath. A live singing sculpture with bird notes through veins in the sheen of its copper. But now I hear years of creation unsung and unsculpted. Percussive machines deafen foliage’s touch against foliage below. Screech upon screech of the slice of a saw severs ring upon ring of arboreal years. It drowns out for always the cello bow twilight oblique over leaves. After they’ve gone, all it was, distant traffic…

car park
for supermarket shoppers
the prices we paid

Diana Webb

The man sat smugly on the bus, holding a framed picture on his knees. He decided to hang it in the hall so that visitors would admire his good taste. He stood on a chair. His young daughter handed him a crooked nail.
–   What the hell am I supposed to do with that?
His wife handed him a knife with a heavy steel handle.
–   What’s this? Christ, I’m living with two idiots!
He tapped the nail into the plaster, then hung the picture on the nail, biting the knife between his teeth.
–    And now for the coup de grass (sic).
He hit the nail hard and the whole lot came crashing down.
–    Jesus Christ, it’s destroyed!
He grabbed his overcoat from the hall stand and left the house. His wife and daughter allowed themselves a little titter. However, they knew there would be hell to pay when he came home from the pub, ugly drunk.

splinter of glass
in the lino –
drawing blood

Gerry McDonnell

Janey was a stableman’s daughter. Swished her tresses from her face.
Lizzy, Alexa and Fanny her sisters in paint were clearly seen. And she was a good woman too.

stitches
chain and whipped back
lazy daisy and feather

Janey was a stableman’s daughter. Swished her dresses round her waist.
Proserpine, Astarte Syriaca, Mnemosthene, she embodied the three of them wrapped in green. And she was a good woman too.

chain and whipped back
stitches
lazy daisy and feather

Janey was a stableman’s daughter. Swished her silks for a flower in place .
Lucrece, Hyppolita, Helen of Troy, all from her needle sewn on a screen.
And she was a good woman too.

lazy daisy and feather
chain and whipped back
stitches

Janey was a stableman’s daughter. Swished her affections without a trace.
Lizzy, Alexa and Fanny her sisters in paint were clearly seen .
And she was a good woman too.

chain and whipped back
stitches
lazy daisy and feather

…

NB: Jane Morris (nee Burden)was a model for many pre-raphaelite painters

Diana Webb

lots of marks
for identifying pieces
thermal cat

‘Raw onion’ the watchword he whispers significantly, and ‘French vinaigrette’ the darkness solemnly replies. A shot rings out through the stillness. ‘You’ve been sadly misinformed my friend.’ He fingers a half-week’s stubble. ‘The dressing was last week. Today it’s pickled cabbage on the menu.’ The crumpled heap of soot clutches his spurting belly, whimpering feebly in the dust. ‘Probiotic, if putrid,’ he continues amiably, returning the flintlock to its holster and receding back into the shadows. ‘Green goddess might have sufficed,’ it spits his last words, wooden teeth grinding deafeningly, guts straining against the ball interloping about their property. Quietly, it expires.

reading roadkill
universal standard for
diagnostic codes

Unaware of these petty intrigues, a stoic trollop three stories above, yawning, dumps her guzunder onto the low kingdom and all its august inhabitants in dreary indifference. He finds, even in death, the stench is repellant, offends his delicate nostrils. Vicissitudes.

Jerome Berglund

this is what the rich do who they call peers associates the planners of their parties that collect most vulnerable prey on and leaves decapitated threats ammunition on critics’ front stoops magazines refuse to print a harsh word having full possession of facts on hand police investigating die prematurely this is what capital buys when you let it accumulate unchecked what are we going to do

seafood buffet
a rare
reflexivity

Jerome Berglund

A crow perched in a tree. When they are silent. They know. Why return to the boat. Once you go. The first tree they see. Cut like a goat. Just. To be.

Robert Witmer