Step back, step forward: A 4LB prose poem

ArtsEtc editor Linda M. Deane test-drives the 4 Love of Barbados prose poem template - to get an idea of what's possible and to encourage others to take up the challenge. The questionnaire is also below as are links to other responses gathered so far. We invite you to submit your most creative, original and thoughtful words. Who knows, they may end up in the 4LB anthology!

 

*

I am Linda.

Storytelling with YOU at the heart

 

Who you?

What part you from?

How you feel bout life in this here Buhbayduss?

In Golden Square: A Photo Essay

Barbadian poet and performer Winston Farrell has been hosting poetry pop-ups in Golden Square, Bridgetown, throughout 2022. Linda M. Deane, who took part in February, offers this alternate take on the popular literary event. Photos by S. Devonish. (Click the photos and scroll using the arrows.)

Those Are Pearls

 

INSIDE THE PRISON was warm. Adrian sat facing a grizzled man through a cracked plastic screen. The old man looked a vision of Adrian himself, in a good few years. The one difference were the eyes. The old man’s had seen plenty.

“Hey, son,” his father said, flashing yellow teeth. “You good?”

“I just here, Dads.”

“You ain’t had work today?”

“Nah, I get today and tomorrow off.”

The smile faded. “How you mother is?”

“She miss you bad,” Adrian lied.

Latest Winning Words Focuses on "Our Uncertain Times"

....Like the world, and its words, are on fire.  This edition's cover is again by Kai Miller.     

 

The following is from the back cover of The ArtsEtc NIFCA Winning Words Anthology 2019/2020.

THESE ARE NOT normal times we’re in.  And they are changing fast.

Ode to the Christmas Breeze

 

Dear one, when I recall
how hot an ting this August did
and den wid all de other nameless ting it had
in all this covid 
You be most welcome den.

I must admit it had me fraid.

Who did not fraid? I ask myself,
and not a soul to hold onto.
So love had to be said
and comfort taken where it will.

And you know how we mout does don't have cover.

THE GATHERING: Barbados’ strike force against the COVID-19 pandemic  

 

PROLOGUE: NEVER RETREAT, NEVER SURRENDER

Story, Script and Illustrations by the Research Methods Class of 2020

Castles

 

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