Robert Sheppard
Professor of Poetry and Poetics
PL for Creative Writing MA
Autumn
leaves are falling
Winter is drawing in
The sun
is low in the sky
Shining
on my skin.
I watch
the buildings around me
And the
people walking in
Confusion
on their faces
Don’t
know where they have been
I see
the young new fresher’s
And the
ones that know it all
Only
time will tell if their grades will
Rise or
fall
I look
over at the lake
At the
ducks swimming by
The long
reeds hide them
As they
bop and play
I
notice the red safety floats
Situated
in the ground
I hope
no drunken students
Jump in
fooling around
The
small golden leaves
Are now
gathered at my feet
And as
I move across the ground
They
crinkle and retreat
They
signify a regeneration
Of the new life that we seek.
Rebecca Whittaker
You stand by the wall, imagining that if you get close enough, you might
merge with it.
They sit in herds and speak in tongues you've yet to understand. Their
voices and their footsteps echo through the room.
Two men are on the other side of an outside glass wall, standing on a
stage of concrete to entertain you. They're blasting away at the dirt on the
pavement, cleaning it as much as they can. They fail. You're bored.
You watch two girls laughing, waving around their sandwiches. They feed
off gossip and humiliation. You're full to the brim but thirsty.
Walking into the shop, you're met with too many options to choose from
and you can hear their laughter from here. You turn back and watch as faceless,
nameless students climb upwards, out of sight.
Alicia Beavis
The reeds sway and
hiss in the breeze. A duck buries it's head under the water, the constant flow
moving it back and forth. Up and down, up and down. It's almost hypnotic. I
feel dizzy. I move closer to the fountain, the slight wind brushing my hair
against my face. The sun glistens, reflecting like sparks in the water.
Students round the
corner, enquiring about fancy dress costumes for the night ahead. I put my head
back, close my eyes, and listen. A plane flies overhead. As the noise becomes a
distant drone, a kind of whistling, or a low hum, I thought, I am struck by the
calmness that suddenly befalls.
I walk inside the
building I had walk out of earlier, the metal stripped front and steps not
exactly welcoming, but pretty nonetheless The far room, the room which had just
minutes previously been filled with eager writers, was empty. I imagined then
how it would be to stand here in the dark...in the silence, because now,
although it is deserted, it isn't silent. The monotonous hum of the projector
fills my ears. Somehow, it sounds much louder if you close your eyes, like the
ringing noise you get after a night in a club or at a concert. Except this is
oddly soothing, whereas the former stops me sleeping.
Emma Clarke
They enter and leave the shadows as they please. A girl with the wind whipping around her
floral print skirt, the breeze exposing even more of the black tights that
cover her legs, passes with a hand tight on one strap of her rucksack. She disappears into the shade of a building,
its form old in comparison to that which stands opposite.
People around here seem lost, or, at the very least,
lacking the confidence of familiarity.
One guy hovers around, his clothes dark like the shadow he stands
in. He covers himself more than the girl
who passes him, her black summer dress decorated in delicate pink petals. She shows a confidence in the way she walks
that is matched by no other. The lost guy
takes a nervous glance at the map and seems transfixed, before moving off. There is no direction in the way he walks.
There is no age here; people are not constrained to
barriers that limit what passes the eye.
Hugging herself in a purple cardigan, a woman bearing the experience of
at least 30 years talks with a crease in her brow. The phone concealed in her hand passes from
ear to ear as she fumbles around in her purse.
As she paces, she brushes past a man with a bulging waistline, his lilac
shirt only attracting more attention to his figure. He walks with a smile through the gaze of a
couple, their hands seemingly forever interlocked. The thick course of his stubble brushes her
cheeks as they kiss.
Minutes slowly pass, and with eyes to the floor, more
feet pass by. Red converses and white
Nikes, some newly-polished loafers on a man with a big stride, a pair of UG
boots on a girl dressed for the chilling weather, a thick grey coat buttoned up
to the top. Their footfalls are quiet
beneath the sound of chatter, the mixture of words clear. It’s clear that the attraction to the campus
passed much further than the scousers of Liverpool as three different accents
drift off into the distance.
“So which uni did your boyfriend go to?”
The answer falls beneath the cry of the wind. The two girls talking quickly disappear into
the blend of students walking without expression to their various
lectures. The ‘early’ starts of eleven am
take their toll on the many nursing hangovers.
Through the ruffle of the leaves, figures move disfigured
through the sunlight. They bring about
the soothing call of the waves with every heavy exhalation of the wind. Everyone around is oblivious to it. They’re all too busy, even when alone. It’s taken for granted, the peacefulness.
More people pass close by. As they disappear off behind, the sun creates
a halo in the blond tangle of a man’s hair.
They meet with two women pushing prams, although no contact is
made. The rolling wheels come closer as
they scratch against the pavement, and I see that both women wear their hair
the same way. One is blonde, the other
brunette, and they walk with the same confidence that their smart clothes
exuberate.
The same sight is starting to irritate. The details in the architecture are slowly
becoming clearer. It’s easier to notice
things. The red bricks seem off-colour
in places, although with no pattern to its design. There are streaks in some distant paintwork
that blend in the light of the sun. One
could question the structure’s age when the campus is filled with the modern
architecture of glass buildings.
The trees to the right form an archway, in a sense. As summer has died, the leaves have already
started to yellow, though some still retain their evergreen colour. Others have taken on a burnt-orange tinge
that seems golden in the sunlight. The
trees cast shadows over those who pass through, and ends in a patch of darkened
shrubbery that bars further sight.
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