Three Poems by Leilanie Stewart

Landmass

 

 

There is a lone                                 stack

standing out at sea,                         a sad

promontory that’s                             jutting

beyond the riptides.                         I often

watch it and wonder                         why

there’s only one,                              because,

surely if it was formed                     by erosion

there’d be more along                     the coast

This is a desolate beach                 to walk along

and when I go there by                   myself, I try to

imagine that under the       surface of the water

the cliff and the stack are touching, holding

onto one another through the swells, and

though the peaks and troughs will do their

damage, what is under the surface will

never be erased, and never be separated

 

 

 

Snowball Effect

 

I’d like to introduce you to

Miss Lauren Tide

She came all the way

From Greenland

And is planning to stay

for a while,

an epoch perhaps.

 

She’ll be bringing along with her

Miss Tundra, Miss Glacier

and Mister Permafrost

 

She was forced to emigrate

from her home, up North,

by convection currents-

hot air brought on by CO2

 

She’ll cool the seas before her,

Push the Gulf Stream further south

 

It’s a waiting game now

for the snowball to come

She’ll wipe out the arrogance

of humankind, with one swipe

from her terminal moraine

 

 

Clam Diggers

 

It’s funny

how when I was little

I used to wear clam diggers

to pick cockles

Some people called them

pedal pushers,

but I never wore them

on a bike

 

It’s sad now

that the beach in which

I wore pedal pushers

to pick cockles

has been closed to the public,

for commercial use,

by proper diggers,

not clam diggers,

for cockle digging

 

 

 

Leilanie Stewart is one half of a writing couple - the other half is Joseph Robert. By day she runs creative writing groups for teenagers and by night she writes and promotes her work at spoken word events in London. Her poetry has appeared in magazines and anthologies in the UK and US. More about Leilanie's writing can be found at www.leilaniestewart.wordpress.com