the kids round here

Grug Muse

the kids round here    they walk 
for miles and miles and miles
to see their girlfriends    meet 
at the old kiosk
to shelter from the rain    and to
kiss    to press each other
up against its perspex sides 
to ignore the smell
of damp and piss

and walking home  they smile at all the birds
whose names they do not know   their memories as quick and shallow
as the streams round here    whose waters are flowing
thick and brown    from all the recent rain 

Grug Muse is a poet, editor, researcher, and educator from Gwynedd, Wales. She is one of the founders and editors of Y Stamp magazine and her she published her first volume, Ar Ddisberod, with Barddas in 2017. Her work has been presented in publications including O’r Pedwar Gwynt, Codi Pais, Poetry Wales, Panorama: the journal of intelligent travel and others. She was one of the Hay Festival 2018-19 Writers at Work. She won the Chair at the Urdd National Eisteddfod in 2013 and the Chair of the inter-collegiate Eisteddfod in 2019. She is currently completing a doctorate at Swansea University on Welsh travel literature.