#AtoZ Challenge; R is for Coral Rumble

Coral Rumble has worked as a poet and performer for many years and now specialises in writing and performing for children. She has three collections, Creatures, Teachers and Family Features, Breaking the Rules, illustrated by Nigel Baines, and My Teacher’s as Wild as a Bison, also illustrated by Nigel Baines, and has poems in over 100 anthologies for young people. She performs and gives workshops art centres, books shops, libraries, theatres and festivals. Her website is here.

Here is the lovely poem Coral has sent for the Poetry Feast – it also has an ‘R’ in the title!

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LOOKING FOR RILEY

Riley had dragged the emptiness to school.
It would seem wrong to leave it in his bedroom
Where he had filled silent spaces with sobs.
Grandma had gone, but her songs hung in the air,
Small memories, pockets of comfort.

And now, in a dusty corner of the PE cupboard,
Riley sat and rocked and clutched his knees,
Resting his chin on his shiny, worn trousers
Stretching over his bent legs, hiding away
From questions he’d be asked, but couldn’t answer.

They were all looking for Riley, the teachers, Mrs Moore.
They would try to wipe his grief away, catch his tears
Before they hit the ground, before they made a mark
In the dust, before they stopped falling of their own accord.
So I hid with him, and somehow, it made him smile.

 

© Coral Rumble

 

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Children’s Poets’ Climate Change blog: Be the Change

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