Roy Gray
Macclesfield
The town where forests, Peak and Cheshire plain
and River Bollin congregate with canals.
Once famed for silk buttons and its share of rain
and grievous wasted, say Domesday annals.
Now barges bear tourists not salt, cloth or coal,
pills replaced buttons, but the downpours remain
and silk is remembered in the football team's name.
Bars on all corners and a church on all hills,
business parks grow where once meadows made hay.
Now parks are workplaces and we live in mills
built for weaving, back when parks were for play.
Three parks are green and pleasant, the rest hold cars.
A bland central plaza the market can't fill
but views east are brilliant from council house hill.
Superstores abound all around the town
along with the usual shops and malls
though the furniture store claims wider renown.
Each spring brings those days when summer heat calls
out languid girls in clothing revealing
their navel, bosom, backside and/or thighs
in fashions created to hypnotise.
On asphalt Riviera of a sea concrete
these artful exposures at mercuric highs
for men and boys both are a summer treat
filling their minds with improper surmise
and beach club behaviour best left in Spain.
Manchester Airport makes comets routine
but red trails in the sunset transform the scene.
Macclesfield Town
The old mill town
Where silk was once made,
Turned to apartments
And high prices paid.
The cinema closed,
To the Litten Tree,
Another pub
For the youngsters to be
Out on a Friday
Or Saturday night,
With trouble brewing,
And fight after fight.
But during the day,
There are shops to frequent,
Cafes and bars,
And money to be spent.
It’s quite an affluent
Place to reside,
Good schools and doctors
And entertainment besides.
Then there is football,
Macc Town FC,
Where Maxonians go
In great numbers to see
The matches and fixtures
On Moss Rose Estate,
Queuing loudly with tickets
Outside the gate.
It’s near to the Peak
National Park
With beautiful views
Which leave their mark.
I’ve lived here for years
And am happy to be,
A Maxonian.
This is home to me.
Ruth Mitchel-Hill 04/04/06
Bun Fight at Sizzles Café
Like we're in some cowboy saloon
she bursts through the slick swing doors
firing numbers from the hip - "thirty six,
egg and chips", (wham zing!), "nineteen,
chips and beans" (whoo whee").
She eyes
us loafers with a mean stare, hard hearted
Hannah, hard-faced, hard everywhere,
the waitress with bad attitude.
She brings
the food through kind of regular though.
The dude by the window draws on
a Marlborough, and through a smoke
screen watches her clean, neat heels
click to and fro...
....then she's gone
for a while and the dude's hungry
smile sets like a cold egg yolk, kind
of dry and yellow,
puckered and pinched
and his nicotined fingers stipple
the table with a dull, no rhythm drum
as he waits for his chow to come.
The crowd hushes up, watches on.
Now she's been gone a mite
too long, and the rippling stipple
of the drumming of his fingers
goes on and on
and a long
low whistle joins the thrum
as his trumped up song sounds
mean.
"Mine's thirteen!"
his long
low call holds its shape in the greasy
air, and we're all occupied looking
nowhere,
and even the x-pelair holds
its whirr, and there is no chink of cup
on saucer, or spoon stirring, or clock
tick, purse click, snap of match
or flick of lighter - it really couldn't
be quieter.
Silence palls
as the whole of Sizzles Café slows down;
waiting for the show down... |