Self Portraits

We asked children to send self portraits for us to use in the design of our anthology cover. Here's some we received by Hayden, Poppy and Archie:

New Boy by Ros Barber

New Boy

He is walking a line; his footsteps mark a square
around the playground. The others forget his name:
a boy that isn’t really anywhere.

Wherever he was just then, he isn’t there
but somewhere further along, just out of frame.
He is walking a line; his footsteps mark a square

enclosing his teacher, enclosing the autumn air.
She blames no-one, knowing she cannot blame
a boy that isn’t really anywhere.

He is more than alone. While other children pair
off by the fence and a penalty kicker takes aim,
he is walking a line. His footsteps mark a square

like the edge of a board, a game of solitaire.
He doesn’t seem to know another game.
A boy that isn’t really anywhere

is on the perimeter. You’d think he doesn’t care
about being different. But still, and just the same,
he is walking a line; his footsteps mark a square,
a boy, that isn’t really anywhere.

Ros Barber

Snakebite by Catherine Smith

Snakebite
(i.m. Helen Penfold, 1961-1999)

Things are looking up. We’ve
found a pub where the landlord,
convinced by my smooth lies, your

proper breasts, will serve us snakebite.
He tips the lip of each pint glass,
froths in lager, pours cider and asks

How much blackcurrant, ladies?
You smile at him, murmur When -
we love how his hands shake

as you take your change.
We gulp like seasoned drinkers,
avoiding the stares of the old gits

with their bitter, their racing pages.
The drink hits the spot and
everything is funny. You nearly

take my eye out playing darts.
And at the Rec on the way home,
full of sugar and gas, we slump

on the swings we dared each other
to leap from as kids, jewelling
our palms and knees with grit.

We lean back under the night sky,
under all the stars we can’t name,
we’re full of how we’ll leave

this dump of a town first chance we get -
how we despise the regular lawns,
the sagging paddling pools, we’re

singing as we approach our road.
Today was hot, like the days,
buckling with laughter, we shoved

each other over on your drive,
the tarmac sucked at our sandals
and the ice-cream van played Lara

from Dr. Zhivago, too slow. Tomorrow
we’ll feel sick as dogs. But tonight,
here, under a bright, full moon,

we’re amazing, and as we hug
on my doorstep, I taste you,
kiss the snakebite off your lips.

Catherine Smith

Make Me Love You by Abegail Morley

Make Me Love You

You taught me how to pinch the sky
and let a gap breathe through the crack,
slowly pulling apart our thumbs and fingers
to capture a person at great distance.

We peered from the beach,
saw far out to sea, chose our boats
from those that bobbed just out of reach -
mine a slim-line yacht with sail ready,
yours a motor boat, fast, white.

We loosened our fingers, let the boats leave the bay
and swam out as far as the old fishing trawler.
We swept our hands along its length,
stroking the weed caught on its side;
it was soft, like a child’s hair.

Abegail Morley

Greenhow Grove by Anne Kenny

Greenhow Grove
(for Mary Kenny)

her small feet are planted
in soft buck leather, in a cobbled street
by a red brick house she will recall
like a scene from an old film

in soft buck leather, in a cobbled street
where children hop-scotch pavements
like a scene from an old film
washing is strung like bunting

where children hop-scotch pavements
and she emerged from the womb
washing is strung like bunting
a first breath of coal-warmed air

and she emerged from the womb
she cradles her doll in a cardboard cot
a first breath of coal-warmed air
unaware she is practising

she cradles her doll in a cardboard cot
by a red brick house she will recall
unaware she is practising
her small feet are planted

Anne Kenny

Watching the News by Geraldine Paine

Watching the News

But we didn't have snow,
I can't remember that.
Nor tank-tracks, frozen grey,
smeared with blood;
the swaddled women,
carrying buckets
backwards and forwards,
indecipherable;
the soldiers firing
at windows

I remember running -
a sudden silence
broken. And a crater
between houses in a garden,
after the All-Clear,
I remember that.
And later, at school,
the two empty desks.

Geraldine Paine