Valentine's Day FOOD POEMS

I was delighted to visit South Camberley Primary School yesterday. We did an activity I am very fond of: writing love poems...to food! I thought I'd take the opportunity to share a few of these poems, which are of course particularly pertinent with its being Valentine's Day today. Enjoy!

Woman With a Baby

As the bus approaches its stop I notice

a woman holding a baby. She cradles it

carefully, shielding it from the rain. She looks

at it lovingly, tenderly – nothing will harm

her baby. We get a little closer and I can

see that the thing she is holding is too small

to be an infant. A puppy, perhaps? A kitten?

Her smile is soft, her gaze aglow. But no –

yet closer inspection reveals the object to be

neither flesh nor blood: she’s cradling

a phone. The woman at the bus stop

is cradling her phone. She gets on the bus,

stepping up with deliberation – careful,

slow. She takes the seat next to mine.

The microchips glisten at the back of her eyes.

Joshua Seigal 

Question Marks?

I like to use the question mark?

I just can’t seem to stop?

It is a little habit

that I cannot ever drop?

No sentence is complete for me

unless I lob some in??

Whenever I put question marks

I break out in a grin??

You may not think it necessary???

Well, I disagree???

A stanza full of question marks

is what I like to see???

Some people think I’m crazy

but they’d better not complain????

At least I’m speaking English

and I do not live in ¿¿¿¿Spain????

Joshua Seigal 

Knowledge

Yesterday my wife said

that she thought a bull

was a female cow. I wondered

how she could have gone

her whole life thinking this.

How is it possible to live

for thirty years on this planet

and think a bull is a female cow?

But I guess we all know

different things; I know

a bull is male, and she knows

what she knows – things that

no one ever should have to.

Joshua Seigal

Shop Til You Drop

I thought I lost my shopping list

the other day in town. 

I started to get weary 

as my spirits sunk right down.

A lethargy had set in

as I crawled along the floor.

Arriving at the mini-mart

I fumbled at the door. 

My eyelids felt all droopy

when I found what I had missed, 

for sitting in my pocket

was my long lost shopping list,

and straight away I felt

a little better than before,

since now I could declare

I wasn’t listless anymore.

Joshua Seigal

Pigeon

I don’t want to read about sick mums or dads,

or families getting separated or dying in wars. 

I want to hear of funny stuff, like the time

a pigeon got caught in our classroom and couldn’t 

escape, its wings flapping wildly, its little feet

hopping from desk to floor to desk. Miss let out

a sudden shriek, and then the whole class

was at it, squawking and hooting and howling

with joy, until Miss sent me to go and get

two bigger boys to help the sorry pigeon on its way.

I told my mum all this when I got home

and, through the dark, the smile lit up her face.

Joshua Seigal 

Got My Number

I close my eyes.

I count to ten.

I do it in my head

and then

I carry on

and count to twenty.

For a while

I think this plenty.

On I go though,

in my brain,

adding numbers

up again.

In my mind

the number mounts – 

as they say,

it’s the thought that counts.

Joshua Seigal