A New Ulster 82

ISSN 2053-6119 (Print) ISSN 2053-6127 (Online)

Featuring the works of Kieran Beville, Patrick Toye, Lucy McCormick, Ana Spehar, Richard Halperin, Melissa Chappell, Carole Farnan. Sunita Thind, Peter Fisher and Charlie Pettigrew. Hard copies can be purchased from our website.

Issue 82 July 2019

A New Ulster Prose On the Wall Website

Editor: Amos Greig Editor: E V Greig Editor: Arizahn Editor: Adam Rudden Contents

Editorial Kieran Beville;

1. The Carpenter’s Daughter 2. The Master Gardener 3. May 1979 4. Seasons of the Soul 5. Making Rainbows 6. Summer Pals (In memory of my father) 7. Cinnamon (In memory of my mother) 8. The Argument 9. Song of Sorrow 10. Mount Nebo Patrick Toye; 1. The First Wives 2. Florence 3. I’m A Dragon 4. The Things That Plague You 5. Falling & Loud Noises Lucy McCormick; 1. Autumn 2. Away with the Fairies 3. Rock Bottom 4. Wishing Stone 5. Small flame Ana Spehar; 1. Easy Thing To Do 2. Greatest Love 3. Here I am Richard Halperin; 1. Waiting in Malta 2. A Letter, Unwritten, to my Father Melissa Chappell; 1. I Loved 2. I Walked Down 3. Holden Village, 2002

Carole Farnan; 1. Dance 2. Goosedawn 3. Poppied Sunita Thind; 1. The Island of Death Behind ‘Pulau Blakang (Malay) Peter Fisher; 1. Killeaton Estate, Derriaghy 2. The New Wig 3. At The End Of The Killing Line 4. Finaghy Primary School 5. Parade Dismissed 6. Riding Shotgun For The Lilliput Laundry Company Charlie Pettigrew; 1. Pebbles 2. Where Has Greatness Walked Upon The Earth On The Wall Message from the Alleycats Round the Back

Poetry, prose, art work and letters to be sent to: Submissions Editor A New Ulster 23 High Street, Ballyhalbert BT22 1BL Alternatively e-mail: g.greig3@gmail.com See page 50 for further details and guidelines regarding submissions. Hard copy distribution is available c/o Lapwing Publications, 1 Ballysillan Drive, Belfast BT14 8HQ Or via PEECHO Digital distribution is via links on our website: https://anuanewulster.wixsite.com/anewulster Published in Baskerville Oldface & Times New Roman Produced in Belfast & Ballyhalbert, Northern Ireland.

All rights reserved The artists have reserved their right under Section 77 Of the Copyright, Design and Patents Act 1988 To be identified as the authors of their work.

ISSN 2053-6119 (Print) ISSN 2053-6127 (Online) Cover Image “Sunset� by Amos Greig

“It is during our darkest moments that we must focus to see the light. ” Aristotle Onassis.

Editorial July has found us once again and with it comes the scorching heat, frayed tempers and lack of community dialogue. The latter bothers me more than the heat does I was involved for years in cross community projects, peace campaigns and lately it has felt like our politicians are trying to throw all of the hard work done by people tired of divided communities. We see it all over the news the treatment of refugees, the attitude towards persons of colour and the privilege that white skin provides to perpetrators of hate.

Still that’s something that we can work on ourselves the first step is a simple hello, get to know another person’s culture, the music, food and arts. We need to look beyond skin and religion (or the lack thereof) fear closes doors and closed doors represent missed opportunities.

We’ve a good mix of work this issue from new upcoming talent, to well established writers, poetry and prose of a good quality. The August edition is also coming along nicely and I cannot wait to share it with the world.

There’s been some major health issues lately indeed the last two years feels like one heck of an uphill battle that makes the punishment of Sisyphus seem tame by comparison, heck I’m almost afraid to go back to hospital in case they find more issues needing treatment.

I have noticed though that the heat is making the bleeding worse which is annoying.

Anyway, enough doom saying and jibber jabber onto the work!

Amos Greig Editor.

Biographical Note: Kieran Beville

Kieran Beville is a former teacher of English and History. He is author of Write Now – A Guide to Becoming a Writer (Limerick Writers’ Centre, 2019) and the novel, Bohemian Fire (pen-name Austen K. Blake, Bohemian Books, 2017). He has had articles published in the Limerick Leader and Ireland’s Own as well as poetry in Cyphers. Kieran has managed youth-work and educational programmes for the disadvantaged and worked in Community Development. He lives in Limerick city, his native place and plays guitar and paints, using various mediums – oils, acrylics.

THE CARPENTER’S DAUGHTER Pinewood shavings cluster at her feet Like blonde curls on a barber’s floor, Rising with the rhythm of the plane in little heaps.

She put the golden ringlets in her hair Playing pretty teacher in high-heels.

Then skipping to the tempo of his steps on the way to mass, With the church-bell tolling time.

Each greeting neighbour blessed in tones that chime.

He towered above her like a spire whose revolving shadow Was the radius of her world.

In the cathedral of his care there was magnificence; Grandeur in his words and ways.

In the horseshoe huddle of the evening fire The fragrant incense of the burning wood Became the benediction of the day.

(Kieran Beville)

The Master Gardener Within the walled garden on a sunny spring day I sat beneath a bountiful beech With its vernal canopy and silver-bellied parasol And watched the master gardener splice two sapling cherry trees.

He bound the wounded hearts, scion and root-stock, with bandage and tight knot.

Skilful as a surgeon at work, He made a bed for the newly-weds And planted them among the forget-me-not.

On his knees as if in prayer he pressed them down with tender care.

And with two sticks he made a cross - and staked them there.

With rugged hands he fussed the familiar earth.

Then I heard him sing an ancient hymn in dulcet tones As he pushed away a heavy stone.

When he stood back and gazed They seemed to look at him in parched appeal For first he gave them water before he slaked his thirst.

He doffed his hat and wiped his leathered brow.

That was forty years ago in May but I still see him now.

(Kieran Beville)

MAY 1979 We kissed beneath the blushing cherry blossom Its petals like confetti in your hair.

Now forty winter seasons have left its branches bare.

Our hearts were grafted on that glorious day.

We didn’t know the destination so we couldn’t know the way.

When we burned together in the summer sun I did not think about the falling leaves of autumn Or that the bridal snow would come.

Many storms have blown and gone.

But I did not know this would be the final one.

No more shade from scorching sun or shelter from the rain Your outstretched limbs will not embrace my soul again.

Yet your glory will abide with me – this much I know.

And the fruit you bore will remain in the orchard that is ours For many seasons more.

SEASONS OF THE SOUL We sat beneath the apple tree, bud unfurling into leaf.

Dreams seeding in the fragrant air found fertile belief.

Thoughts germinated and took root.

And the blossom of bountiful boughs bore ripened fruit.

Shadows lengthened in the evening sun, Reaching boundaries and beyond.

We sipped the fermented, intoxicating truth Listening to the evensong.

The autumn of your auburn hair was frosting winter white.

The seasons of your soul laid bare in the fading light.

The contours of that lovely face lifted from your book Mapped the history I traced in your every look.

You yawned and stretched – bare limbs uplifted to the peeping moon.

Pillowed on my chest you lay in rest, I dared not speak and break the spell.

How blessed I was I cannot tell – an epitaph too soon.

(Kieran Beville)

MAKING RAINBOWS We danced beneath the arch Where sun-drenched laughter Echoed through the carefree days.

The apple-blossom scented air Proclaimed the season of the year.

And magic colours spanned our world And shielded us from tears.

Exiled from that Eden now I search to find the path to that homeland of the heart Forgotten in the overgrowth of time And the briars that ensnare.

A distant moment of delight Refracting hues of happiness In shards of broken light.

(Kieran Beville)

SUMMER PALS (in memory of my father) Swimming in the black-backed, silver-bellied, rocky-river Laughing with the lapping water Pals plunging- like otters in the sky-printed pool.

In my soul you linger like a summer evening.

My shadow nearly as tall as you.

Ripened by your radiance – Your palm as rough as a dog’s paw brushed my cheek You smiled when I winced.

I still hear you singing “Shenandoah” in the smoky porter air.

Home on the bar of your bike, that big heart beating near my ear.

Strange to be lying stretched on your empty bed When word came knocking to my sleepless head – My brother brought the news, "He’s gone" he said.

I held you shoulder high, shuffling in the solemn day.

A pall-bearer of the past, carrying memories to the grave.

On your shoulders I once sat, celebrating victory at a match – Oh what a joyous day was that!

I was light but you were heavy I laid my burden down, not ready.

(Kieran Beville)

CINNAMON (in memory of my mother) I remember your lips mumbling in prayer Your fingers fumbling with the beads I was too young to know you had cares and broken dreams.

Then one day I saw you cry but didn’t ask why.

Your floral apron pressed to my face My schoolbag flung for the embrace.

I try to trace the fading memories of you But time it has erased all but few.

When I smell cinnamon I remember you in December.

In the supermarket today I walked the aisle Where nutmeg, candied peel and glazed cherries were arrayed That made me smile.

Baking Christmas cakes With Mario Lanza belting out carols You harmonised, endearingly out of tune.

I stole a cherry and you scolded me in feigned rebuke.

Singing at the kitchen sink – Aromatic potions – strewn about Vanilla essence and little mysterious bottles From the out-of-reach cupboard.

Your magnetic laughter drew me to you I lingered like a loitering moon in the morning sky.

You were baking memories every day!

The bread I feed on now.

In the evening you put satsumas in my stocking And a fist of Roses too Caps for the gun and holster, which I already knew From their hiding-place in your camphor-scented wardrobe.

Then when you thought I was asleep You had a glass of sherry to wet your lips.

Your cheeks were rosy by the glowing fire But your eyes were veiled in mist.

On Christmas Day you laughed and cried And I wondered if you were happy or sad But now I know you were lonely for the precious ones who died And to be with the ones you loved, were glad.

(Kieran Beville)

THE ARGUMENT My words came like hammered sparks from the anvil Bright and burning hot.

Beaten out with strength and ringing in your ears Producing tears.

You aimed to appease – I intended to defeat.

In victory I am vanquished.

My Desdemona – a heap of rags.

I cannot bear the thought of you and me apart.

If I could put the bellows of my lips to yours I’d fan the flame of love into your heart.

(Kieran Beville)

SONG OF SORROW Scavenging in the aftermath of your leaving.

Looking for the manna of hope.

But only barren leaves are falling.

Foraging for meaning in mysteries.

Kicking leaves and killing time – a wilderness wandering.

Memories – milestones in the heart’s pilgrimage Mark the journey.

I am crossing burning bridges Rescuing remnants of the past Meeting ghosts who greet me by name.

It was the torch you bore for me that set the flame.

And I am stranded on this sterile shore.

Alone Amongst all the other broken and abandoned things.

I have pitched my tent beneath your sky.

Though your face is distant as the moon I will blow you kisses And whisper wishes into the void until the light has come.

Singing songs of sorrow Beneath the dying stars.

The fraying fabric of my world Unravelling in the night – My wounds becoming scars.

A bog-soft bed beneath my bones Beckons me to rest A fog-filled field of ghostly calm A haunting in my breast.

(Kieran Beville)

MOUNT NEBO You touched my lips with burning coal Your spirit breathed to fan the flame Your fire consumed my very soul You spoke and said my name.

I gathered manna like mushrooms on moist September mornings My feet wet with dew.

You have written your law on my heart of stone.

My sojourn has come to an end – Alone.

The fugitive years and shepherd skies.

The courts of Egypt and Pharaoh’s lies.

The miracles and magic and the darkness that could be felt.

The summit of Sinai, holy ground and burning bush…

The grumbling in my ears.

The weariness of wandering in the wilderness years.

I dwelt in tents and entered the sacred tabernacle where you spoke.

In the marble palace I learned their language and read their books.

“A basket case” I heard them whisper and saw their devious looks.

The host of chariots snapping at my heels – The parting of the sea…

But nothing has prepared my heart for the parting of you and me.

You have lavished me with love but I must languish here.

The staff has fallen from my hand.

My dusty feet have climbed this hill.

I see the Promised Land that I will never enter now For I displeased you and I see it in the furrows of your brow.

My tears make drops of blood in the scorching sand.

My bones will mingle with the dust Moab will be my place of rest An unmarked sepulchre my curse Beyond the borders of your love The memory of being blessed – Only let me hear once more the voice so small and still And I will watch the sun go down from this foreign hill.

(Kieran Beville)

Biographical Note: Patrick Toye Patrick Toye is a writer/poet living in Galway City, Ireland, and has been writing poetry for the past ten years. Native to County Donegal, he studied literature in the National University of Galway, leading to his his work being published in the NUIG’s “Poetry Collective 2011.” More recently, he had his poem “Iodine” featured in “The Messiness of Human Relationships,” an ensemble theatre piece that closed the Galway Theatre Festival 2018.

THE FIRSTWIVES

They met for a funeral in the palace, Men in French gloves opening trenched doors for a woman in a grey trench coat.

The family huddled in a wicker-room with a tea service, With a tabletop-cherub dispensing liquorice cigarettes for sullen mouths.

The children played with waiting room games and dice, The medicine in reading the newspaper to the pews of crossed eyes.

Sisters, ancient to new, a newly-engaged ballerina with crass ankles, Her fiance with his hand on her breast, unaware of the witches pouring something into his glass.

Pleasantries, the generations spent apart, play-talk with the children, Holding their chins aloft, their babies-flesh a lime-like crown on their grave, And the sisters place their own specific crowns on each of their own heads.

In the drawing room, the will is read; Long, something for each woman who pours herself a bourbon, And eats with her palm under her chin, counting futures like a waiting room game.

Each sister is assigned a gift, feels the knees of each invisible demon plant on her, Warn her of such bleeding treasures that tricks her greed.

One shall speak to birds, one shall speak to the rain, One gets her first gift and her first demon, and she screams.

They trace the family tree, deciphering how old each gift is, Where the pacts came from, how many voices were packed inside the dead sister, That killed her.

They hear of the original woman, who wished to stand as stalk to be fucked, And for that, the old God cast her out, used chest to make himself another woman, Who’d lie for anyone.

How the deserts outside the Garden filled the blueberry-macaw veins with venom, And one name of God cut a claw into this blueberry-macaw and insisted on one hundred dead babies.

And these mourning women in their pointed heels and hard dresses, Are the last of royal blood splattered with the blood of babies and the men who wouldn’t give them any blood at all.

Women, wrong in their nature, sip on their slimming cocktails, With their crass ankles, to the side, and under their chairs, Armed with a skill for the future, and a finesse for finger-walking a way into yours.

They sign their flowery names, call lawyers to pick who shall inherit their new burdens, For none of them want what every first-wife woman in their family had.

And they leave their blackened palace, which Gods don’t stare too closely at.

(Patrick Toye)

FLORENCE

She walks the streets with an umbrella, And a cosmic coat.

She shops for things she needs, and she looks blue-beautiful.

Perhaps she wears her wedding ring, black-beautiful.

Punch Romaine, I write plays, the rain plays on the umbrella.

Pressure on the brain, giddy men, she shops for the things to cook these men.

Wine to boil-drink down to brine like a boy moves for time alone.

Letters of blue coats are enchanted, lectures on Dante on quiet streets where, People wonder on the hair, the shoes, the maybe-ring; Today, there is a stranger in Florence.

The apartment is high, gilded; we dance at events, Men in your plays have written to see the hair, the voice, the mind, The refugees, spas and cosmic coats.

The silent beauty, with his patience. “I could marry you now, you know?�

And what shall I cook tonight?

I have a shelf of oils, oils holding bulbs, oils holding you, In a hibiscus-bottle of lychee ink and carousel cigarettes that once held tea.

A glass of Bourbon; I cook the meat, I braise snatches of common herb, To vinyl violins in separate rooms in my high apartment.

The sleeves rolled up, blood and work pooled up, I sip with these, Professional ideas about what to write.

The husband may not be home for some time, So that I may design until all is right.

(Patrick Toye)

I’M A DRAGON

Death came to the door one day, And someone with eyes like mine allowed him in out of the rain.

He said, “There are ways to twist men from ants to snakes, And back again, And to live with a man who is a fox is to always live in the dark, But I am a dragon, which means I don’t live at all.”

THE THINGS THAT PLAGUE YOU

There’s a meek shy child in my kitchen, Roped by the pretension in his blood, from his mother, from his grandmother.

With a blade too big, he cuts vegetables while, Standing on a tall chair called “Independence.”

In his fog are demons with broken hands that look just like him.

They play in the scenics which make him a man, Along the muscles of his chest, between his legs, In the way he can’t sleep.

I see them now, in everything he does.

It is hard to name them all, so I just coronate in unison When I have to raise my voice.

In times of duress, I see them breed.

The child touches the blade and it turns to gold, But he can’t see it; He is on the other side of the planet, working through The mathematics of success.

He controls everything over there.

There, men and women all lick their words and play games with him, Games of competition, of teasing, of who has the most star.

The shy child paves his world in good food and guitar music, Looking through the eyelashes of his grandmother to a world needing more of him.

He imagines himself a god with broken hands that has much work to do.

This is the man that I love.

(Patrick Toye)

FALLING + LOUD NOISES

And I tell my life now to a loose of tea, With balayage on my wrist, and moral applications taking my money by the lamp.

I thought, long ago, that paranoia is an echo on everything, Everything everyone says and does; prescribed by the survivalist in us all.

Therapy from the dramatist who writes your life, And writes your monsters into the spaces where a monster can fit.

In the base of your belly, a fragile hurt of burning water, The colour of tea and fear; one prick of a lie, and it drips into you.

The painting of a coffin becomes a smoking gun, And you spurt with ways to disarm the entire world and project yourself straight to the harm.

The echoes come in different colours; this, you know.

They say the same words, but all mean different things.

One is always truthful, one is always angry, and none are ever wrong.

The real failure, I have found, is to ever be proven wrong.

And I think that I’ve been written a monster who doesn’t see me, And if he does, he never says.

The burning water tips towards him, forever wanting to be stroked to sleep, Forever meekly wanting to stop him.

I would like a story without fear, to not smell the weakness on people, Like a dead blood on a dead belly from a smoking gun.

To be deaf to the echoes of various colours making prisms, Through a hurt and burning water, That writes love + fear into spaces where love + fear can fit.

(Patrick Poye)

Biographical Note: Lucy McCormick Lucy is a 17 year old aspiring poet living just outside Belfast, Lucy has only recently taken up writing poetry in the last year. Poetry is a way of expressing her inner thoughts and ideas and Lucy has found it to be beneficial to their life in general.

Autumn

Looking through the speckled window at the amber slowly engulfing the trees To change their perspective on a new season breeze The sky a frosted grey All one, all together Painted a back drop to this new expression of weather The gentle breeze coursing through the leaves to make that of a serpent’s rattle The wind carrying a chill to pass over the land to tell those out that change is coming fast Never settled not even for now Not even for then

(Lucy McCormick)

Away with the fairies

Frail, face cracked with age Canyon lines at the side of a smile White hair like a Dalmatian pelican Eyes glossed over in swirls of zaffre and Carolina blue Figure hunched in a night gown of lilac rhododendron patterns Arms rested upon the darkened hickory leather upholstery of the arm chair Eyes staring empty into beyond Left alone Left in silence Because she is “away with the fairies�

Eyes begin to drop and vison blurs Darkness creeps in

Eyes clear to find one in a forest Bare feet on moss Sending an energetic chill up the frame The sun rising to paint the ancient oak with a new regal gold And to shine through the dew drops on the ferns The wind steepeling through the birch leaves making the wild awake with a fluttery gutter

a quiet tingle and jingle to advert one’s eyes to a lily, thin stemmed with a white porcelain veil on top.

A small hand clasped around the base.

A blue bell fitted over the nest of flaxen curls which hung around the pair of pointed ears.

A pair of silk wings sliced silently through the morning breeze.

A brass bugle held firm in the other hand.

Eyes meet with confusion and wonder, for then unprompted the lesser associate glided away to which the elder one followed in suit stumbling like a young fawn over water logged undergrowth blanketed in green foliage fallen by summers closing she was away with the fairies

the petite figure danced through the magnolias and ashers, pranced over the poppies and daffodils, swung around the sunflowers and snap-dragons, all while playing small airy tunes to wake the land of its restful solitude.

Crossing the lovers gate with ease To find the small messenger of Titania perched upon a water clover rested upon a coal covered lake blowing the bugle to anticipate

first toes submerged, ankles, knees,

waist wading like a work horse over sodden fields then shoulders. the creature on the clover smirked and beckoned with its hand to come forwardthe rocks gave out from undercold, coldness covered in shock gasping for breaths that are not there, nor will they ever be, arms becoming weak from trying and she closes her eyesshe went away with the fairies

now an empty arm chair lies vacant with a back door agape so, no one saw me go, they let it be so and now through the woods I went with my kind-hearted friend.

Now I lie under like narcissus only from within To be and to forever stay.

Because I went away with the fairies

(Lucy McCormick)

Rock bottom

I felt it scrapping at my soles Skinning them slowly My wings were faltering and unable to keep me at living level This had been the prophesied reality for a while now

My feet were getting caught on the remorseless surface below Toes turning under after colliding with fragments of sharpened basalt Forced to place feet upon the place we all dread the arrival of.

Some have been down here so long you may call them residents their feet red raw and pulsing with pain.

Others, the lucky ones, view it from between their toes

I unfortunately have reached its location But my reservation is not for long

(Lucy McCormick)

wishing stone

gifted to me a few years ago, was your beloved wishing stone

waiting in its little box of ivy green, you will never know how much it meant to me

When I hold it in my hands with my fingers tightly clasped I go back to all the memories that have now passed

“made from Connemara marble found only in the mountains of Galway” it won’t be long until both of us dawn the day

Myself from the nest of home And you from life all alone

Hold it in your hand and make a wish So, you know that when you do depart you know you will be missed

(Lucy McCormick)

small flame

Oh, small flame Dancing upon the sill Wavering in and out of the pearl moon rays Swirling under the sweetness of twilight Oh, small flame don’t leave me!

Dont let the darkness take you Or the nightime break you Oh, small flame don’t leave me!

In a cold chamber on my own Your swaying beguiles me Reminds me of my lover.

How we would sway upon the vacant road under the shine of Luna in each other’s warm embrace to the silent orchestra of our minds intertwined oh, small flame don’t leave me! please let the memories keep me for I miss that time so dearly I beseech thee. oh, small flame don’t leave me

(Lucy McCormick)

Biographical Note: Ana Spehar Ana Spehar is from Croatia, living in Cork for last 3 years. She is studying English literature and creative writing at the Open University.

Her work was published in A New Ulster, Boyne berries, Solstice sounds and in a poetry anthology A Journey Called Home. Most of her poetry is love themed as she finds love to be an endless inspiration.

Easy thing to do

It was such an easy thing to do, To fall in love with you.

To fall in love with the spark in your eye And the joy you hide in your smile.

With your kiss you’ve burned my skin, Made my heart come alive, my world spin.

Oh, it was such an easy thing to do, To fall in love with you.

(Ana Spehar)

Greatest Love

It was fate that brought me to his land, To this island, with the fields so green.

Where I fell in love holding his hand And fell apart by losing him.

Though I will never again be a part of his day And never again of my night he’ll be a part, On his land forever I will stay.

Here, on this island, where I have lost my heart.

Forever we will walk under the same sky, And we will be looking into the same sun.

Forever we will share your ground Ireland, he and I, Where the greatest love ended before it begun.

(Ana Spehar)

Here I am

Here I am, in front of you, Naked to the soul.

Have my bones, have my flesh, You can have me whole.

Take my eyes, take my lips, All that I am, all that makes me.

Take it, make me yours.

I don’t want to be free, Now, when you own every part of me.

(Ana Spehar)

Biographical Note: Richard Halperin

Richard W. Halperin holds Irish-U.S. dual nationality and lives in Paris. His collections are published by Salmon and by Lapwing. His work is part of the University College Dublin's Irish Poetry Reading Collection Archive. These two ANU poems are from a short collection-in-progress entitled All That Russia.

Waiting in Malta

Acts 28: 1-10

It was a nice visit. I forget How many days. We accomplished Some good things. Our hosts were Good to us. Then we left, sailed off.

Did they know what we were about, Really? Did we know what they Were about, really? I think not.

The warm feeling of it remains To this day. Of all I have written About our travels, the little Malta piece Remains my favourite: the lovely Incomprehension of something Entirely pleasant. I have a feeling, Sometimes, that such experiences May outlast the universe.

(Richard Halperin)

A Letter, Unwritten, to My Father

A letter, unwritten, to my father.

I am often in the middle of one.

I do not remember how I began it.

I’ve no idea how I’ll end it.

I am not very old in the middle of the letter.

And I am too shy to write much.

I shall make the middle Brahms.

My discovery tonight of the Intermezzo in E flat major.

He loves Brahms and may not know this Intermezzo.

He could use the solace of it Although I dare not use the word solace Or he will know I know.

He will be happy for me That I like Brahms.

Except for the worst, Brahms is always there.

It is easier to be in the middle Of a letter to one’s father Than near the end.

And how to begin it Is always awkward.

Biographical Note: Melissa Chappell

Melissa A. Chappell is a writer living in the state of South Carolina in the United States of America. She deeply loves and derives much inspiration from the land upon which she lives, which has been in her family for six generations. She loves to write, play the piano, listens to folk music, opera, and rock. She has published poems for the Harbinger Asylum, and a poem for the Pulitzer-nominated Epiphanes and Late Realizations of Love. In 2018, she published her first chapbook with Desert Willow Press, Rivers and Relics and Other Poems. This year her chapbook Light, Refracted, is being published by Finishing Line Press. She is a Pushcart Prize nominee.

..

I Loved

I loved the way you lay in the grass at the winery that spring day by the river, gazing at me.

The breeze caught your hair, the breeze caught your fine, dark hair.

You didn’t think that I saw.

I loved the way your hair always fell in your eyes, and you brushed it back, brushed it back with a soft hand.

I loved the way your eyes, the color of pine bark, searched mine, searched mine for some pattern, that you saw in everything.

I loved the way you touched me, as if I were the most delicate rose,

the way you touched me, with a tender hand as though you might bruise me.

I loved lying with you, and you spoke of Bach, and leaves and the wind and how they are circling, circling as to an allemande, as patterns in the cosmos.

I loved all the patterns that were ours.

Tender like a young pine sapling Joyful life the geese on wing.

Strong like a mountain.

But I did not love you.

(Melissa Chappell)

I Walked Down

I walked down the old road after you died, the days ahead lost beneath the pine straw, grace, floating like light from the fragile sky.

These woods, by other beasts are occupied.

I commenced my search for hoof or a paw.

I walked down the old road after you died.

I saw where the deer go at night to lie; Until the morning, safe from tooth and claw.

Grace, floating like light from the fragile sky.

The bend in the road ahead; it is mine This time, I called the way good, without flaw.

I walked down the old road after you died.

I walked down, and there was time, by my side.

I walked down, birds, healing my wounds so raw.

Grace, floating like light from the fragile sky.

An old crow flew over, his calls deride, Yet he simply warns against death’s great thrall.

I walked down the old road after you died.

Grace, floating like light from the fragile sky.

Holden Village, 2002 The Old Copper Mine

At dusk, often I would uncork a bottle of whatever was beneath the kitchen sink, sit alone on the front porch in some rustic rocker, warm in my fleece, in cosmic disbelief that I was here, a negligible speck, in your shadow, you terrifyingly beautiful Cascadian mountain.

Tomorrow, in the burnished light of the afternoon, I will walk down to the old miner’s bridge that spans the river,.

i will sit down and let my legs dangle over the edge, watching the rioting waters beneath my feet.

I will wonder wonder what it would be like to cast myself, in bliss, from the bridge, like a shovel full of copper, to disappear in the cyan waters, into the glacial surge.

Borne down the river, I would be a speck of copper momentarily infinite, rushing away, like a terrifyingly beautiful mountain,

that, at length, dissolves, and hastens to arrive, in prodigal joy beyond the sea.

(Melissa Chappell)

Biographical Note: Carole Farnana Carole has been published in Washing Windows? (Arlen Press), three

Community Arts Projects Anthologies and Shelter N.I. and Mindwise newsletters.

Dance

It’s like this: I feel the music in my feet then my bones whispering in every cell: dance, dance, dance

dance yourself out of the ordinary out of your shell out of your two-feet-on-the ground

stance

dance yourself into a rictus of rhythm cascades of shapes unbridled joy and

expanse

dance like a demon

a dreamer a dervish

entranced

dance like the surf like the sunlight like the leaf blown by

chance

Just

dance.

(Carole Farnana)

Goosedawn

Dawn dribbles into day; a sickly light lays bare the leafless limbs of trees lashed by a night of storm winds, battered into quiet submission.

The air is still now and at peace.

Suddenly a pulsing greyness strafes the oaten skies, a shimmering chevron pulled eastwards by its cries.

The squawkish signature of geese.

(Carole Farnan)

Poppied

The funny thing is they weren't there before the bulldozers bullied every blade of hayseed grass two, three months ago from the no-man’s land that skirts our little cul-de-sac, but underneath they dozed: an armistice of poppies ready to encarmine the field and bleed their petals into the street.

(Carole Farnan)

Biographical Note: Sunita Thind

Sunita has always been passionate about her writing and now has the time to concentrate on it fully. She has dabbled in many things including being a model, primary and secondary school teacher and trained as a make up artist.

Make up, writing and animals are her passion. She loves to sing and take singing lessons and have a beautiful, male Samoyed puppy named Ghost.

Sunita has had poems published in The Curlew, Eye Flash Poetry Journal,

Indigo Dreams Publishing Magazine-Sarasvati, Pulsar Poetry Ezine, Picaroon Poetry, The Blue Nib and High Window Press. Sunita feels that her poetry is experimental, especially from a cultural point of view.

The Island of Death Behind ‘Pulau Blakang’ (Malay)

Singapore seemed electrified, fizzled, the wailing brightness, smacked itself against the screens of cars, the grotesque tragedy of not being allowed to live in this micro paradise permanently. My dad had seven sisters, six of which resided in Kuala Lumpur and my mother had cousins in Singapore. Being from a Punjabi, Sikh background, Singapore was like an Eastern Pandora’s Box I would open throughout my childhood and life. Away from the bleak and featureless Isle of ‘Queen Lizzie’ and the cultural constraints of familial life as a young South Asian girl/woman.

Everywhere were rippling wet foreheads, domes of moisture and fluid dripping sticky down torsos, inside shirts and soiled petticoats. It had been my second home for a long time, I adored riding the air conditioned and immaculate monorail, smelling the exotic diets of the indigenous people wafting through the carriages. There were solid jade blockades of greenery and phosphorescent, vertigo inducing buildings rising towards the heavens. Everywhere seemed to sizzle and boil, this kind of shimmery and frustrated heat made you exhausted, even before you had reached your destination.

There was a stampede of too sultry days and a lurid light in the coming days. I noted the solid blockade of jade green trees where everything sizzled. The climates apparent problem was it glimmering heat.

My mother’s family had emigrated to Singapore from Malaysia some decades ago and owned a string of compact sugar cube like flats. This was a cosmopolitan city, a cultural hot pot of many different races including Punjabi (my family), Tamil, Indian, some Malay people, but a largely Chinese population.

In Singapore’s China’s Town I would find a secluded spot to peruse the shops and restaurants. Cooing at the jewel tones and imperial and oriental architecture. Wedging myself in an intimate restaurant watching the supremely flammable dishes being brought out to slobbering customers on steaming platters. I usually ordered gallons of ‘ Oolong’ and Jasmine tea, and just people watched, I was on good terms with the owner and would order dim sim: dumplings, sauces of variant colours, bite size ‘wontons’ that were crêpey and translucent creams, noodle rolls and egg tarts.

Sometimes I would consumed all the delicacies and other times I would nimble on them. Sometimes the people that I would observe would be glossy as a photo or they would seemed dulled and sullen of youthful or glittering with curious eyes. They could have an old innocence or a young innocence it did not matter about the age. So many colours, honey melon yellow, razor blade silver, garnet brightness, vulva pink just vivid.

I recall the white day, the sun was spawning its rays into the sky and they bounced off ruinous buildings that had opulent histories. I wore a dress that was a shade of blood burgundy, with amazing black crystal encrusted ankle boots that showcased my elongated limbs that people said seemed to go on forever. I was not accustomed to the sparkling humid.ity

You could see the sunburnt injuries of the sun inflicted on my mother’s face.

The heat smacks you in the eyes, liquefying your innards, brain and all. Frying your genitals. I also had consumed seafood that day, in Singapore at a food stall, it was cheap there, it was fried some sort of Stingray washed down by sugar cane water, then some star fruit with drizzled honey and an Asian Beer. I remembered the juicy slice of orange dawn that had met me at the end of the evening.

How to decipher this jewelled hotness on the magnesium white sands of Sentosa Island’s Siloso Beach, where I had fried my body for some many summers to a chocolate hue. The cyan water seemed to be carbonated and the fizzy waves would slush along the beach leaving in its wake seaweed and occasional dead jelly fish and shells. It was a long sheltered beach, when I was eight and we would have any celebrations on the island I would be dressed in a short Chinese silk jacket and white pleated skirt, we would eat food and set off firecrackers and get ‘ang pow’, money in red envelopes from our Punjabi and Chinese relatives, interracial marriages were not as uncommon as some may think in South Indian culture.

Sentosa meant ‘peace and tranquillity’ in Malay, which originated from the Sanskrit term meaning ‘contentment’. I never really knew this, what was more disturbing was when it was a British Military base once and a Japanese Prison of war camp it used to be referred to as ‘Pulau Blakang’ which in Malay means ‘Island of Death Behind’.

Maybe there were lots of hungry pow (prison’s of war) ghosts driven by such

impassioned emotions ambling and dawdling along the beach. I felt this shrill chill, as I sensed their animalistic and ancestral eyes boring into me with a kind of deviant glistening shine. Almost in their sad damnation they were not venerated any more by their relatives. There was reclamation of the land from the sea and seventy percent of the island was covered by rainforest with monitor lizards, screeching monkeys, rainbow bright parrots and vanity driven peacocks.

The crystal bright musical fountains would cavort around with watery glee and were a prized attraction. The prismatic attraction seemed to publish the sky with delight and abstract shapes of wondrous luminosity. My cousins and I would stay until the oily darkness of the night would gag a golden and weary sun smudged by an upset lipstick sunset. We would let our honey coloured toes subside into the crumbling sands and try and catch lava orange crabs in cheap, neon bright plastic buckets to release, sometimes my uncle would spike and fry them on a small beach fire to have as a snack. It was a macabre sight to see my uncle consume lobster and wonton soup. He would select a ruby bright lobster from the fish tank of the food stall near the beach for his meal. I remember wanting to emancipate this crustacean victim. Protuding was the monolithic stone, white Merlion, this cultural edifice, a mythical creature with a lions head and a fish’s body, it embodied Singapore. Singapore’s original name was ‘Singapura’ meaning lion city.

‘Gon Xi Fa Choi’ a sharp scream that had reached a new octave, it was Chinese New Year. A swirl of amethyst and kaleidoscope bronze fizzled between fireworks ….

Oriental faces scruntinised the illuminating and dangling lanterns, they seemed to be multi coloured, crepe paper and crinkling. The sky seemed a glossy blue...

I wore a ‘Cheongsam’ (Chinese Silk Dress) of shimmering turquoise, it almost had a metallic haze around it. It was embossed with sewn golden floral detail and the odd, red fire dragon. The silk sheen seemed appropriate in the almost Chinese tea room that also had bamboo green matting and Oriental silk screen paintings. There were some porcelain Chinese deities adorning various shelves behind where we were. It also doubled up as a restaurant for a new years feast. I adored all the trinkets, a new dimension of pepper red and pomegranate diffused into the room. My cousin Jaswinder had obsidian hair, night coloured hair, he was chomping on a juicy candy floss pink prawn. The crowds outside were rowdy and my aunty put a protective arm

around me. We feasted on coconut rice with soy sauce, fermented tofu and stir fried greens with chilli chicken and thick stick noodles.

The skyscrapers, broad leaved parasol trees, colonial spires, Buddhist and Oriental gardens and architecture personified the exoticism of this urban jungle. The Singaporean night seemed like a glittering oddity to me, I had come many summers from infancy, adolescence, to teen hood and now adulthood. The moon was frosted, I felt more at home here and in Malaysia where my much of my extended family had resided more than the bleakness of England. The streets seemed studded with Buddhist temples and trinket shops. The Eastern dimensions of the strewn Buddhist temples I liked to languish in, this psychotic break of glitter.

Was I a cultural leech in this micro ethnically diverse cosmos, I adored one specific Buddhist temple it was the ‘Kwan In Thong Hood Cho Temple om’ 178 Waterloo Street. It was built in 1884 and was dedicated to Kwan Im (Guanyin) the goddess of mercy and was a refuge for the sick and destitute during the Japanese Occupation. I would go there to meditate quietly among the holy shimmer and the flurry of people. I would pray for sick relatives but more recently myself as I had a metastatic body, I had Ovarian Cancer. I would kneel on the prayer carpet in front of the Buddha this lapsed Sikh girl, melancholic hazel eyes and toffee skin. I didn’t want any tumours to be wrapped around my remaining ovary and commandeering my body. I prayed for Guanyin for compassion, this Bodhisattva. The temple was bustling with luckless devotees.

The temple was an example of ancient Chinese courtyard architecture, its rainbow bright craftsmanship, its emerald light and melancholic tinkle brought me peace, away from this mental and emotional mutilation. In the prayer hall kowtowing to the Goddess of Mercy, yellowed swastikas adorned the roof, the ridges embellished with calligraphy and decorations signifying good omen which I could suckle up like sacred godly breast milk. The aroma of incense stagnated outside the temple in an urn, the incense sticks would stain the temple ceilings with soot just like those cancerous cells were tattooed on my body. My fertility was dying like the scented smoke of the I-ping sticks….

The glazed beams of a bronze flourish seem to electrocute the air at my cousin’s Punjabi wedding, she was marrying a Caucasian man, much like I had in the UK.

Weddings were generally the reason why we came so often to Malaysia and Singapore. Guests of caramel, macchiato, chocolate and coffee tones seemed to multiply in the luxurious banqueting sweet. Everyone was pollinated in sequins, crystals and diamanté, jewelled saris, parrot coloured stalwart kammeez (Indian Suits), rhinestone sherwani, festive turbans and Indian gold and Anarkali jewellery and industrial quantities of cosmetics plastered on sweaty faces including my own, my false lashes were half off my clown painted visage and the I had sweated off my gold eye glitter.

A poem I wrote best describes the wedding and set the scene:

Indian Wedding Party

This plethora of swollen jewels tattooed to her skin.

In this peculiar procession of arresting silks.

Sari-emblazoned and oozing gold jewelry swelling caramel bodies.

Sweating like drenched fish in this bedazzled, break dancing Bhangra festival.

Dola is drumming with its gunpowder beats.

This flashy fish scale wives, gyrating, thrusting with sparkle pop dexterity.

This rainbow screeching and streaking.

The luminous lashes jewel spun bride This tripped oriental delirium.

Caked in cosmetic artistry.

Quaking elders shriveled with their husband and turbans and head scarfs.

Hideous coughs of glitter.

Flame curling curries, thigh deep infuriating sabji’s and crackling poppadoms Chomping at the bit for methi (sweet -in Punjabi).

Oily orange ‘Jalebi’ dribbling.

Dazzled in a crown of flowers are the unwed sisters.

Reveling in heavy handed flashes of Nikon.

Lakes immolating gemstones.

Sodden in crazed tears of loss grappling at her father’s shoulder.

Eyeballs like pickling onions.

Levitating on gold thread.

To foster the bonds of matrimony‌ Clogging her dainty mouth with egg less, wedding cake.

Enticing hands drew her in, frail, glittered bridal body into a boa constrictor crush of affection Plying her, feeding her.

A reservoir of bronze bodies, feasting, swiveling, and frolicking in Hindu melodies.

The altitude of the Far East, this juxtaposition with her bleached bridegroom.

Salivating Auntie-Ji’s cooing over cobalt blue eyes, oozing over his creamy agelessness.

And how his genes will prettify the Asian gene pool.

His luminous beauty against this dusky daughter.

Out of her doll shell this bride panting into her new western reality.

Imperial white and Sanskrit dark.

Chewing on her twinkling chuni (headscarf) now caught on her scintillating nose ring.

I presented this poem as a present in golden calligraphy on an ornate card to my Singaporean cousin Yasmin as wedding gift. I was weighed down in a regal gold and hot pink crystal studded lengha (Indian occasion/ceremonial top and skirt). Before my airport departure I sponged up the sedated nostalgia. The droppey eyed western guests were bedazzled by the strobe lights and the sun-these pale figurines were lobster burnt and almost scorched to the skin. Suspiciously navigating the ethnic and cultural borders, the ambiguous customs. Borrowing countries and cultures from each other. I grabbed a delicious plate of fish curry and a plate of Dosa (a flattened, layered piece

of rice batter) noted the high sari count in the area know as ‘Little India’ a renowned part of city.

The aroma of greasy parathas and sweet cardamon tea wafted up the vibrant street to my nostrils given me a tropical sense of Deja vu.

(Sunita Thind) Word Count: 2000

Biographical Note: Peter Fisher

A Gloucester based poet, he has eight published collections to his credit, including ‘Not All Men Are From Mars’, a compilation celebrating women, which has raised £2000 for the charity Women’s Aid. His work has appeared in Cotswold Life Magazine on a monthly basis for more than ten years.

Festivals performed at include Aldeburgh, Brighton, Cheltenham, Dartmouth, Henley, Ledbury, Ribchester, and Wells and Glastonbury. Amongst his 31 written poetry 1st prizes are those of Bedford, Birmingham, Leeds Peace, New Forest, Northampton, Poetry Life, Royal British Legion, Southport, Ware, Wilkins Memorial & most recently the Sentinel Quarterly. He was nominated twice for the Forward Poetry prize (but got neither!) and appeared in the 1997 Forward Prize anthology. His poem ‘Pawn Promoted’ was put forward by the prestigious ‘Raintown Review’, for the even more prestigious American Pushcart Prize (at which it sank without trace…). He captained the Hammer & Tongue international team Slam against the U.S.A., which took place in Bristol. Peter was the Poet Laureate for the Gloucester Millennium project in 2007-8, has broadcast on both B.B.C. 2 & 4, as well as being a regular on B.B.C. Radio Gloucestershire’s breakfast programme. His verses have appeared monthly in Cotswold Life magazine for well over a decade.

KILLEATON ESTATE, DERRIAGHY I was there at your genesis, Killeaton.

The Park, the Gardens, the Crescent sloping downhill to the Lisburn road.

Early purchasers, our removal van nosed between already occupied houses with newly seeded front lawns.

Scant yards away, this emerging order dissolved into a wallow of plots ranging from pegged-out foundation to near completion.

Competing with the rumble of laden lorries, the sounds of saw and cement mixer formed a constant challenge to family conversation.

While adults were preoccupied with settling in, we youngsters had leisure, outside school hours, to explore our ever-evolving neighbourhood.

Tight-rope walking on unfinished parapets, making a gymnasium of all scaffolding, we swarmed like inept gibbons around the site.

Minor vandalism was committed with water-butts.

Sand pits and gravel heaps were plummeted into.

I’m-the-king-of-the-castle endlessly enacted.

Come snow time, we fashioned slides on pavements, which our imperilled elders spoiled with ashes shovelled from fireplaces, to our indignation.

Eventually, habitations completed, a parade of shops opened. Hoardings proclaiming ‘J.F. McCall & Sons, Builders’ were removed.

Somewhere between the last ‘semi’ sold and the opening of the neighbouring McGredy’s Rose Gardens

by Violet Carson, we achieved community.

(Peter Fisher)

THE NEW WIG I unlock the door of the second floor flat, transit the hall to her living-room, with its view of the embryo Twinbrook estate, acreage of skeletal scaffolding, backed by the rearing bulk of Colin Mountain.

Familiar furnishings, exclusively remnants from more substantial homes stretching back across two centuries in locations as diverse as Portadown, Derriaghy, Cushendall and Dungiven.

The weights of a grandfather clock manufactured for Grays of Belfast in the early nineteenth century require urgent adjustment. I restore its steady, ticking heartbeat to the room.

Mementos of previous generations, an ivory mahjong set from Hong Kong, silhouettes with starched shirt fronts, wing collars, sustain the family credit in an age which would astound them.

Trinkets fronting well-stocked bookshelves, figurines crowding the window sills, plumped cushions in the sole armchair, a place for everything and everything in its place, appear to await her return.

Only a hat-box on the dining-table, round lid tilted against the wallpaper, seems out of place. I lift out, then replace the contents, absently smooth brunette hair as I do so.

The new wig must have arrived in the morning, as she waited for the taxi-cab to ferry her on the short hop to the hospital.

She wouldn’t have gone without it.

(Peter Fisher)

AT THE END OF THE KILLING LINE Age: 15. Height 4’9�. Status: executive. Evidence: tie, shoes, clip-board, nervous tic. Duties: weighing, (in transit, left to right) wheeled vats of kidneys, hearts, heads, trotters, sweetbreads, (in transit right to left) clean trolleys, stacked with shop-bound products. I subtract tare of vehicle from weight of quivering offal, push periodic slips through pigeon hole to super-exec in portaphonebox with own stool. View: tiles, hooks, swinging carcasses, flashing knives. Leisure activities: lunch break soccer in loading yard with vat and trolley shovers, all twice my size, with socialist principles, clog shod, or else watching older hands play billiards, in a Capstan Full Strength cloud, amidst a grunting, coughing scrum.

Places I seldom go, if I can help it: 1. Upstairs, where there are people in suits. 2. The opposite end of the killing line, where pigs are individually stampeded through a channel, underneath a rusted stile, where the man stands with the fag hanging from his lip, one eye closed, the long mallet arcing over and down.

(Dunmurry. N.I. Bacon Company I think the name was.)

(Peter Fisher)

FINAGHY PRIMARY SCHOOL

At Finaghy Road Primary Mr. Glass caned you, Mr. Scott caned you, But when Mr. McCutcheon caned you, You stayed caned.

Interminable repetition Of dates, of events, Of chorused, chanted lists; Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy‌ Gang warfare in lunch break, Through neighbouring estates.

Ammo dumps of stones, Discarded vegetable roots.

Lesson one in mob rule.

The first issue of the Topper, Free, from a newsagent On the Lisburn Road.

Opening night of the Tivoli cinema, Free also - and crammed!

Mr. Glass had a twin Who taught at Derriaghy.

Mr. Scott showed you how To make stuff from raffia and cardboard.

Mr. McCutcheon caned you.

And you stayed caned.

(Peter Fisher)

PARADE DISMISSED

My child-wide eyes applaud the undulating myriapod, bowler hated, sashed, grey suited, concertina’d, bagpiped, fluted, turning the sloping field beside my home into a glory that was never Rome.

At length, the beast disintegrates.

Gallagher’s Blues and Player’s Weights are lit. The bladder-pressed give thanks to God for the command “Break ranks”.

The whole parade reforms, a solid wedge along the stagnant sheugh behind our hedge.

Chivvied indoors, I charge upstairs, scrambling upon the bedroom chairs to reach the window. All I see, (before the adults collar me) vapourised urine, pungent yellow clouds, the rest, a tangled hedge of privet shrouds. ( Outskirts of Portadown, on the Tandragee Road )

(Peter Fisher)

RIDING SHOTGUN FOR THE LILLIPUT LAUNDRY COMPANY

Aged fifteen, I tunnelled my way out of school, Accepted the position of van-man’s delivery boy From the Lilliput Laundry Company in Dunmurry, The manager said I was just the size, ho-ho-ho, My driver described me to customers as his shotgun!

Mondays, our route took us round central Belfast, Picking up and delivering overalls, mostly, from joints Like the plastic production firm, where workroom air Was polluted with slivers of shiny dust particles, Everyone wheezed and the foreman tipped me sixpence.

Tuesdays found us in and around the Ardoyne area, Where I toted parcels up very long, narrow gardens To identical doors which swung open to reveal Dark hallways uniformly ornamented With a crucifix, a picture of the Virgin, and/or tricolour.

Wednesdays we travelled the length of the Shore Road, Ablaze with Union Flags, depictions of King Billy, Beneath which strode shipyard workers, whistling ‘The Sash’.

We didn’t care whose dirty linen we collected in the days Before private dwellings possessed washing machines.

Thursdays we took to the hills, visited remote bungalows, Farms, ate our sandwiches beside a drab monument Overlooking the lough. Once a hiker came along With the first transistor radio I’d ever encountered.

It told us that Hawaii was now the 50th U.S. state.

I can’t remember where our Friday wanderings took us, Can’t even remember the driver’s name. My weekly pay Was two pounds nineteen shillings and sixpence, of which I was allowed six shillings pocket money. I remember I had to take a pay cut when I left to join the Air Force.

(Peter Fisher)

Biographical Note: Charlie Pettigrew

Charlie Pettigrew. Is originally from Armagh, but currently lives in Barcelona.

Pebbles

You pick the pebbles on the beach And are that child again.

Weighing one above the other, Listening to the sea's refrain.

The past is not out of reach.

Your father walks with you again.

The stones in your hands Are passed between you Like a chain of sea washed gems.

You wait expectant And his smile envelops you In winked complicity.

A moment shared in blue Sky, waves, pebbles and felicity.

(Charlie Pettigrew)

Where has greatness walked upon the earth?

For S.H.

Where has greatness walked upon the earth?

Look no further than the concrete floor

Where a farmer´s son took his first steps

Into the wideness of the world.

Peer into the lighted dancehall where a mother´s son

Danced the girls no one thought to ask.

And when his stride took him beyond the fields

To the cathedrals of learning and high art,

Marvel at his surefootedness on the high wire of fame,

The lightness and heft of his step.

(Charlie Pettigrew)

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July’s MESSAGE FROM THE ALLEYCATS:

Turn down the sun it’s too hot and bright. Where does the time fly? It seems like it was only last week when we were busy making the January issue meow!!.

Well, that’s just about it from us for this edition everyone.

Thanks again to all of the artists who submitted their work to be presented “On the Wall”. As ever, if you didn’t make it into this edition, don’t despair! Chances are that your submission arrived just too late to be included this time. Check out future editions of “A New Ulster” to see your work showcased “On the Wall”.

We continue to provide a platform for poets and artists around the world we want to offer our thanks to the following for their financial support Richard Halperin, John Grady, P.W. Bridgman, Bridie Breen, John Byrne, Arthur Broomfield, Silva Merjanin, Orla McAlinden, Michael Whelan, Sharon Donnell, Damien Smyth, Arthur Harrier, Maire Morrissey Cummins, Alistair Graham, Strider Marcus Jones Our anthologies https://issuu.com/amosgreig/docs/anu_present_voices_for_peace https://issuu.com/amosgreig/docs/anu_poetry_anthology_-april