Woman takes a bus in India

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  Here's a poem I wrote about taking the bus in India, which got left out of the collection 'Sips...,' unfortunately.
  
  TOO CLOSE
  
  I
  My parents, landed with luggage
  In the lurching bus, handed me
  Over the jammed bodies
  To the seated conductor.
  The blue-uniformed, paan-chewing
  Dispenser of tickets, keeper
  Of a bag full of jingling change,
  Held my three-year-old body
  Locked between his knees
  As he ripped off a ticket
  To Paris or Moore Market,
  And blew a whistle in my ear.
  
  II
  I leave a laugh at the doorstep
  And plunge my body sixteen
  Between the backside of a fat woman
  And the violence of a thousand rearing men
  Who plough into a city bus, every hour
  On the hour, to sow their bulletin.
  
  The numb, dumb anger
  Of a thousand sournesses
  Raise head and spear this body.
  They grind and grind like teeth
  In a fever of sleep,
  And the hot release of stoppered sex
  Scalds me again and again,
  As the bus jerks to its destination.

SI LEEDS shortlist

I've been shortlisted for the SI Leeds prize for Black and Asian Women, for my collection of short stories, 'The Weekend For Sex.'

Check out my bio and read an extract from the title story (also check out the competition):

http://sileedsliteraryprize.wordpress.com/news/meet-our-shortlisted-writers/http://sileedsliteraryprize.wordpress.com/news/meet-our-shortlisted-writers/

Click here for the website

Longlisted for the Montreal Poetry Prize.

Fingers crossed for the shortlisting.

Sips That Make A Poison Woman

My first book of poems is published!

Available on amazon uk. Follow the link by clicking on the title.

More publications/prizes

Well well, Poetry! Who would have thought. I wrote and sent a few poems off last year, and won a prize which means my first book, a collection of poems, will be coming out this year.

http://www.ravenglasspoetrypress.co.uk/entry2010.html

Also cannibalised a chapter from the defeated first novel for the Asham short story award. Here is the hooray-inducing result:

http://www.ashamaward.com/

Watch this space for release details of my first poetry collection from Ravenglass Press.

Poems I wrote at 18, as the Pioneer of the movement “Gibberish”

SUMMER

Burning coal black gold

Sleeping in the afternoon.

Eyes shut, streaming with light,

Eyelids closed against the glare,

The rotating blades drag their wings,

Chopping the swollen air,

Cutting strips of heavy heat

That unravel gracefully spiralling

Down on the supine form

(on the body on the bed),

sweat beads glisten and roll down,

breath hot moist the pillow heat,

the light turns white to yellow to orange

as the clock hands creep toward six.

Waking up is hell, the head swims groggily,

The mouth coated with bitter slime,

Eyes water down the stored up heat.

Bloody Sunday afternoon.

PIECE OF DIRT

It lays lightly, covering your skin,

A grey coat greasing clingily clad.

Drag a finger along the skin

Like furrowing a fertile land,

The straight black line forms

And thickens under the fingernail,

Flick it with the sturdy thumb,

Out comes a beautiful crescent moon.

There’s beauty even in the black grime

That touches but a tender eye,

Look and observe, and you will penetrate

The secret of the creation of the gods,

That there’s beauty even in a piece of dirt.

LECTURE

Swollen eyelids shutter down every

Six and a half seconds

(droning voices all around).

The dragging pen scratches forlornly,

Wandering away from the steely lines,

To be brought back to place with a jerk.

The top of the head separates and swims

Upward and away, slowly,

While the droopy eyes watch,

And slowly settles down again.

The head then nods losing its

Centre of gravity, strains the neck

Threatening to snap.

It grows like a Jurassic baby,

Heavy and ponderous, has a

Magnetic attraction towards the

Book on the desk.

Fatal attraction.

Thump. ZZZZzzzz.

ZOMBIE LAND: the idiot’s box

Turn it on and it takes over life,

Spewing sights and sounds on a rote,

Monotonous in its continuity,

Never fatigues, never dims its fiery colours,

Keep at it, the brain turns mush,

The body mashed potato served on comfy couch,

The dish garnished by slender remote.

Staring zombies stare deaf to each other,

Meals untasted, books rotting away,

As minds dip and immerse in fantasy land,

In the bottomless pleasure pits of Hollywood,

Or the slimy spicy cauldrons of Bollywood,

Or other stuff all far removed from reality.

Seething sanity buckles under

The muddying pressure of cheery crap.

A DYING CAT

The last of the leaves fall

In the autumn dusk.

The last of my days trickle past

Slowly slowly . . . crushing, moaning.

Snaps of memories

Fade in . . . fade out . . .

The first scratches . .

The first kill – a limping rodent,

The scald from the first hot milk,

The stinging laughter of the kid,

And my revenge . . . shredded leather deat.

The first female – virtual lioness.

I peer at a raggedy cobweb

Through rheumatic eyes

And try to feel toothless gums

With a slow, curling tongue.

I look out the window again,

At the last autumn leaf,

Grey and wrinkled,

Teetering on the sinewy branch.

Publications

Well, well. Never mind the novels, the first one that is sleeping in the dusty cupboard, and the new one which is sitting at the desk, half hanging out of my head.

My short stories are getting about in the world.

First, last year, 'Bhai and the Manager' was published in Riptide Volume 4

Second, this year, 'Kite Season' a story from my MA submission, is shortlisted for the Riptide Short Story Competition, and will be published in Volume 6

check out http://www.riptidejournal.co.uk/