Active Voice: Poets’ Corner – Giving a Voice to our Creative Talents

We are departing from our traditional Active Voice “tips” this month to bring you a collection of thought-provoking and evocative poems, created by us – the good folk of Voice At The Table. We asked everyone on our core team to “get creative” and we’d like to “gift” our rhymes to you as a Christmas treat. Enjoy…

Twenty-twenty came to a halt!

Twenty-twenty had a big fault;

All the world’s brainiacs, brilliant women and men;

Scrambling for a vaccine so we can party again!

 

But life goes on and we are near the end

Of this peculiar year when facemask is a trend

Lockdowns, quarantines, two metres, even better

The days of 2020, we shall fondly remember… not!

By Alice Hutton

 

 

Make America great again, he said

I will build a great wall, he said

We need global warming, he said

Grab them by the p*ssy, he said

I’m smart, I don’t pay taxes, he said

I don’t need to wear a mask, he said

The election was rigged, he said

Go away Donald, you’re done, the world said

By Jane Ashley

 

 

Dancing Leaves

Where do the leaves go?

When the wind blows?

Dancing and playing,

Twisting and turning

Funnelling upwards,

Spinning and falling,

Whirling like dervishes,

A Tango, a Rumba,

Better than Strictly!

By Melissa Jackson

 

 

Disruption

Disruption has upped its game

Disruption has just gone full-time

Disruption is here to stay

What are you going to do about it?

You can’t discipline it

You can’t make it redundant

You certainly can’t furlough it!

You just have to deal with it

How do you deal with it?

You have to meander, like a river runs through it

You have to find a way

Disruption is here to stay

You have to sit with it

Entertain it

Pour it a nice cup of tea

Interact with it

Even do a Zoom, when it feels like doom and gloom!

Disruption is our new and unknown best friend

Go on, I dare you, open your arms and give it a big warm hug!

By Joyce Osei

A Dreamer am I

Roses are red

Violets are blue

We all have our colours

Your beauty is within you

We bow to tradition

Convention is King

But people are different –

That’s the value we bring

Imagine a world full of Lemmings at work

Imagine the monotonous drone of their quirk

Forget creativity, forget innovation

All of us slaves of our own limitation

But enter the prize of a more tolerant mind: a creature of wonder – one of a kind.

Emotion is stirred

Our pulse quickly rising

Our sense of vitality oh so surprising.

Diversity is the intrinsic value we bring

Our beautiful minds full of marvel and zing.

Be sure to invite it – just open your mind!

The eyes will then follow – leave all fear behind.

Your roses still red and the violets still blue

But you’ve taken a leap

Now your dreams will come true.

By Rina Goldenberg Lynch

 

 

Ahhh the ever-present voice of self-doubt

It sits in my brain, sucking the oxygen from the fire in my belly

“You can’t do this”, “no one cares”, “don’t bother”, it roars

And the fire, once raging, fuelled by an explosion of ideas

It dampens

Subdued by an impossible list

And yet the embers still glow

Persistent, impatient, encouraging

And so, I pause

Take a breath

Think

What is one thing I can do right now?

And I do it with no expectation of anything more.

By Jude Sclater

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