Open 'mike' evening March 14th 7-8.30 All Welcome

Come and celebrate the launch of Belinda Hunt's new poetry collection, 'Windows and Doors'

on March 14th 7-8.30pm

Light refreshments

Readings by staff, pupils and published authors, book signings, songs - An evening of camaraderie and words

RSVP bhunt@mountschool.com

House Poetry Competition...Some of the highlights...

Sorry Sorry Sorry - by James Carter

Chosen by Elli Taylor Jukes - Year 9

Sorry, I wasn't listening
to a single word you said
I drifted off into the mist
that grew inside my head

Sorry, I wasn't listening
I didn't hear a sound:
I went where dreams of dreams have dreams
and sky and ground swap round

Sorry, I wasn't listening
aliens were at the door
asking for directions
to the planet XR4

Sorry, I wasn't listening
some pirates came for me
first I had to walk the plank
and then I made them tea

Sorry - I wasn't listening
I don't know what went on
could you say it one more time -
hang on - where've you gone ?


Five Ways to Kill a Man - by Edwin Brock

Chosen by Mayuka Saegusa - Year 8

There are many cumbersome ways to kill a man.
You can make him carry a plank of wood
to the top of a hill and nail him to it.
To do this properly you require a crowd of people
wearing sandals, a cock that crows, a cloak
to dissect, a sponge, some vinegar and one
man to hammer the nails home.

Or you can take a length of steel,
shaped and chased in a traditional way,
and attempt to pierce the metal cage he wears.
But for this you need white horses,
English trees, men with bows and arrows,
at least two flags, a prince, and a
castle to hold your banquet in.

Dispensing with nobility, you may, if the wind
allows, blow gas at him. But then you need
a mile of mud sliced through with ditches,
not to mention black boots, bomb craters,
more mud, a plague of rats, a dozen songs
and some round hats made of steel.

In an age of aeroplanes, you may fly
miles above your victim and dispose of him by
pressing one small switch. All you then
require is an ocean to separate you, two
systems of government, a nation's scientists,
several factories, a psychopath and
land that no-one needs for several years.

These are, as I began, cumbersome ways to kill a man.
Simpler, direct, and much more neat is to see
that he is living somewhere in the middle
of the twentieth century, and leave him there.

Winter by Ramesh Anand

 Chosen by Muobo Moses-Taiga - Year 7

Winter dawn
A patch of clouds
Blossom a bare tree.

Holding on
With what she left behind
Winter moon.

Winter rain
The urge to feel
The newborn.

Full moon
Winter's stillness
In a soap bubble.

Uphill walking
She takes me into
Winter clouds.

Winter deepens...
Lungi shivering on
The beggar's face.

On the rock...
The descent of water ends
Winter's loneliness.

Winter twilight
Homing mynahs
Over my backstroke.

To be, or not to be...

House Poetry Competition 

– Heats 07/02; Final 14/02

Aim

• for all girls to participate and enjoy and develop skills in reading and recitation
• for Houses to develop and recognise skills in their cohorts
• to win House points

Process – yrs 5-11

• All Girls to learn a poem of their choice off by heart and recite to their class in English lessons. Two girls from each Key Stage from each House to go forward to the Heats. To be completed by 06/02
• Heats to take place on 07/02 in House Assemblies where Houses to vote on finalists one Junior and one Senior
• Finals to take place on 14/02; venue Gym 1.30-2.30.

One junior and one Senior winner.

Early Years – Yr 4 Finals to take place on 14/02; venue Gym 8.45-9.45.

Prizes

• All participants to receive 2HP
• All KS winners to receive 5HP
• Finalists to receive 10HP

Exciting New Poetry Anthology...

Windows & Doors - Belinda Hunt 
A Collection of Poetry

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Paperback    ISBN: 978-1-909227-27-9   Price:£8   Order direct from     www.mardibooks.com

ebook ISBN: 978-1-909227-02-6 Price: £3 Order from www.amazon.co.uk

  

‘My poetry is about observation and story-telling. The poems in this collection have been selected from a daily output written over the last year. The seasons unfold against a backdrop of local and international events. Scandal, debacle, the Jubilee and the London Olympics are juxtaposed with more personal histories. The words of participants and of detached observers, find the tramp in Hyde Park valuing the broadsheet for its thermal quality and the young boy experiencing his first football match just after the publication of the Hillsborough Report. The collection provides poems that are structurally diverse, but common to all is a truth seen from the perspective of the persona, both public and private.’  BH, 2013.

Belinda Hunt’s first collection of poems is about the power of the ordinary day to change our lives. These stories take us into significant hours in people’s lives through the kaleidoscopic world of the 21st century. The ubiquitous Mrs Jones has her entrances and exits, but rarely steps onto the same stage. When she reaches her destination, she may even find that her audience has left. There are no easy answers to be found in this collection.