Digital Poetics 3.8 Auto-poetics at Turf Projects
The following are a selection of pieces produced during a writing workshop conducted by Azad at Turf Projects, Croydon on 16/04/22
Earworm Tallulah Griffith
A bit like an ouroboros, chasing its own tail
Boring, loudly.
Starving lobes and stifling thoughts
Slime trails, muffling membrane
Sticks to the sinuses
A stowaway smuggling stolen goods
Junk mail lyrics
Itch like a bad taste,
Eat their way
To the tip of the tongue
I try to relieve the pressure by
Spewing the words backwards
Spat them at your plate
While you weren’t looking
Inner echoes carve out hollow places
For prayers, pregnancy, intervention,
Grooves in brain like grooves in vinyl
Deeper every turn
When will things feel new again and
Can someone please change that godawful song
Tallulah tries a bit of everything. Her writing frequently centres on social justice issues and has been featured in Wasafiri, the Oxford Review of Books, and Tate magazine. She likes discordant music and very tiny flowers.
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January/February Christopher Hunt
The sun rises
Streetlights flicker out
The fox stops, stares, ducks away
I walk/run the well-worn path to the gym
A cat crosses my path, intent on its business
Pays me no heed.
A young fox looks up from its dinner, watches warily
How close am I? Six feet? Five?
Where do the foxes go?
Under a gate, over a fence
Look into an entirely enclosed yard – nothing there
No 530
Junk mail has been gathering into a snowdrift behind the glass door
Suddenly, signs of life
Letters gathered up and dumped in the recycling bin
Overgrown tree cut back
Re-usable furniture in the garden with a note – please take
What story lies behind the door
A long illness
Is this a preparation for death
Downsizing as the owner goes to sheltered accommodation
or a home
Or a consequence of death
either way, an owner never to return
The schoolboy creeping
Mother walking ahead on the way to school
Son, whining with his duffel-bag
Ten, Twenty paces behind
He appears too old to need the company
Old enough to resent it
Sometimes there is maths drill
“seven sixes are” “forty two”
“eight sixes are” “forty eight”
One day she is smartly dressed
Not jeans and windcheater
Suit and a coat
An interview? Important work meeting?
Did she wink?
Does she recognise me?
Fresh from the gym
Hair drying
How many years before I say “hello”?
Christopher Hunt is currently working as an Information Technology lecturer at a Further Education College. Previous published work includes letters to The Times, journalism with DYP Group and contributions to Ghana Review International. He also edited the staff newsletter for a leading UK management consultancy.
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Two Poems Robert Leslie Lovejoy
Robert has been a MOSS collective member since 2013. He is inspired by his day to day life visiting various areas of Croydon and documenting his journeys. His work is influenced by his passion for Science Fiction, vampires, rock music, local history and his family. Robert’s work provides a creative outlet for the emotions he experiences from his sadness to his unique sense of humour.
He is a keen comic creator and poet, weaving stories regularly using glitter gel pens, pencils, felt tips and collage. He sells his work as greeting cards in shops around Croydon and original artworks in Turf’s online shop. Robert is currently working on his first anthology of poems.
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The moral right of the author has been asserted. However, the Hythe is an open-access journal and we welcome the use of all materials on it for educational and creative workshop purposes.
