Poem by Paul Tristram

Crossbows, Porn Mags, Tobacco

We saw it whilst hanging about
in a rusty old, graffiti covered
bus stop down The Saltings.
It was written upon a scrap piece
of paper in cheap green biro
stuck to the rain soaked pavement.

‘Crossbows, Porn Mags, Tobacco’

Stevie burst out laughing instantly,
Hog spat out some of his beer
while I just stared at it smiling.
“Is it a shopping list?” I thought aloud.
Two middle-aged women were
standing close by watching us amused,
one of them came over and looked
down at it and said with a shriek
“It sounds like a right party,
you boys going are you, you look
like you’d enjoy that sort of thing?”
But no we did not go there
even if it was a party at all?
Instead one of us killed himself,
One of us went insane and stayed there.
Whilst the other tried both for awhile
then moved himself far away
and started writing Street Poetry.

Paul Tristram is a Welsh writer who has poems, short stories, sketches and photography
published in many publications around the world, he yearns to tattoo porcelain bridesmaids
instead of digging empty graves for innocence at midnight, this too may pass, yet.

Allison Goldin is an artist living in Cambridge. Her work is a collection of spontaneous drawings from the imagination. The most common link throughout her art are the semi-recognizable creatures scattered amongst and bringing together the surrounding doodles. She is currently studying Illustration at The School of Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.