A progressive analysis of politics and the arts.
by Kev Walker
Content warning: mentions domestic violence, substance misuse, neglect and self-harm
He woke in the morning, as often he’d done
awake with the birds and the half risen sun.
The room was a tip, he hated it so
but to tidy takes time, it was time to go.
Throw on some clothes from off of the floor
kick his way through the grubby, knuckle-marked door.
Sneak down the staircase, dodging needles and glass
peer into the lounge, they’ll be easy to pass.Continue Reading
The cover of Better Watch Your Mouth displays a set of lips and teeth pulling the kind of expression you would make after being told such a thing. It suggests an unapologetic rejection of censorship, which is later reflected in the poem ‘Ugh, Men’ with the statement ‘we will not censor ourselves (x3)’.
This is a collection that mixes everyday language with profound metaphor, and beautiful imagery with emotive stories. It begins with the telling of others’ stories and gradually becomes more personal, yet in a way that is also relatable, as time skips back and forth like the mind floating back to memories, some singed with pain and others with nostalgia.
by Alex Valente
Original Italian by Maddalena Lotter (1990-), ‘Un ricordo d’infanzia’
We built a house on the sand
then we stamped on it.
On its ruins our supreme leader
decreed it was time to goContinue Reading
drank from lakes
that turned out to be droughts
cut our lids
to see the future
tricked crops
into growing
mined coal with safety pins.
‘It’s time for celebration, not gawking
at deaths crushed by credit,’ you say.
sick dentures pushing teeth back
broke vessels
gold-cracked chinas
rusty hammers made from origami cranes, pinkwashed. never grow
tired of going to the bank, where each need is a static noise
& a gunshot,
where you tell me,
‘you &I are beings in boats.
you&I are
establishments.’
wasting the column. no column. no pronoun to speak.
rather the gusts than a wall
rather understanding than secular missionaries
rather the freedoms of you & me than glass ceilings
rather the prickled rose we will hold firmly than the diamond-sculpted cross
rather the blood &organs than shed skin
rather the body of blood & sinews than war-torn factories
this is stinking of sweet sorrow,
where dystopias are youth’s memoirs, &
where adulthoods are delayed because there is no
money & water.
& until this day, we are sat on swings
that you say will break from our weight.
Featured image via GlobalSocialTheory
Borderlines is a collection of thought pieces, some creative, some direct accounts, some memoirs, all true. Borderlines collects stories from people who are not fleeing from one country to another, but rather chose to move, or were made to do so by a series of non-threatening circumstances. In these stories there is anger, hope, disappointment, joy, fear, optimism. They are all different, and yet all striking in their approach to the subject matter.
Borderlines aims to show the reality of migration, and how we are all, in our own way, migrants.Continue Reading
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