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WHO IS A CARER?          ARE YOU A CARER?         CARING ABOUT CARERS  

                                            BARRY TEBB

                               LOOKING BACK

                   KITH AND KIN (Sixties Press 2004) 

                                          CONTENTS 

BARRY TEBB

LOOKING BACK

I have hidden my children’s faces

One frame behind another, both beneath the cover

Of a mobile-user guide. I cannot bear their st     ares

Of innocence when both stood condemned to madness,

The scars we bear sufficient witness.

Whose guilt? God’s, our’s, malign genes,

Or the shame of random chance – depending on the weather’s glance

A brewing storm signalling the deity’s wrath,

Branches flutter in agitation, I remember sins,

Half-forgotten, lies I’ve told, acts of minor dishonesty

Decades back, my protestant ethic shudders at the facts.

Catholicism’s more generous and over scrupulosity a greater sin

Than the infinity and grains of guilt gathered by the moral nit picking

My Methodist mother ingrained in me.

In my sixty-third year I start remembering sins I never committed

And wish I had: the younger generation all seem mad,

Ignorant or sad, my own children especially.

Guilt’s a decoy for helplessness, envy a disguise.

I should have been a rock-star not a poet

I think as I try on a hat in a charity shop

The double of Boy George’s, that’s someone I really admire

A latter day Liberace wearing a wedding gown

To an audition in pouring rain before he hit the number one spot

With Karma Camelian

I used to dance to it alone, imagining taking Suneetha,

To a ball at Eton. Her skin was oiled amber,

Her breasts twin pearls “Shall I off the light” she’d whisper wickedly.

I’d always correct her but she never got it right.

Like Simmons everything with me starts with a fuck or a fight.

One Carer’s Story - Barry Tebb       Schizophrenia - A Carer’s Journal - Mike

     Schizophrenia – A Mother’s Story – Georgina Wakefield                         My Journey Of Sadness – Stan Hagon

                                       The Voice Of Carers – Amanda Cummin           Yemeni Carers’ Stories – Debjani Chaterjee

   Beyond Our Reach, But Not Our Love – Brian D’arcy                        Carry On Caring – Emily Machin & Lucy Machin

     Enigma And Other Poems - Georgina Wakefield                        Killingbeck Drive – Brenda Williams

      Searching The Beyond And Other Poems – Daisy Abey     Sharp Edge – Daisy Abey     The Long Good Bye – Barry Tebb

      Looking Back – Barry Tebb     Nameless In Camden – Brenda Williams      Autobiography – Simon Jenner      

The Sick Image Of My Father Fades – John Horder      Are You A Carer?      Caring About Carers