A New Ulster 118

FEATURING THE TALENTS OF Micheal Lee Johnson, Gavan Duffy, Terry Brinkman, Micheal Boyle, Noel King, Fionnuala Curran, Z D Dicks, Jason Visconti, Sheeba Varghese, R. W. Haynes and Susie Gharib EDITED BY AMOS GREIG

ULSTER

Copyright © 2022 A New Ulster All Rights Reserved.

The artists featured in this publication 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)

Edited by Amos Greig

Cover Design by Upatree Press

Prepared for Publication by Upatree Press

CONTRIBUTORS

This edition features work by Michael Lee Johnson, Gavan Duffy, Terry Brinkman, Michael Boyle, Noel King, Fionnuala Curran, Z D Dicks, Jason Visconti, Sheeba Varghese, R. W. Haynes and Susie Gharib

CONTENTS

Poetry Michael Lee Johnson Page 1 Poetry Gavan Duffy Page 6

Art/Poetry Terry Brinkman Page 13 Prose Michael Boyle Page 20

Haiku Noel King Page 27

Poetry Fionnuala Curran Page 30

Poetry Z.D. Dicks Page 32

Poetry Jason Visconti Page 38 Poetry Sheeba Varghese Page 42

Poetry R.W. Haynes Page 44 Poetry Susie Gharib Page 51 Editor’s Note Page 60

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE: MICHAEL LEE JOHNSON

Michael Lee Johnson lived ten years in Canada, during the Vietnam era. Today he is a poet in the greater Chicagoland area, IL. He has 264 YouTube poetry videos. Michael Lee Johnson is an internationally published poet in 44 countries, several published poetry books, nominated for 4 Pushcart Prize awards, and 6 Best of the Net nominations. He is editor in chief of 3 poetry anthologies, all available on Amazon, and has several poetry books and chapbooks. He has over 443 published poems. Michael is the administrator of 6 Facebook Poetry groups. Member Illinois State Poetry Society: http://www.illinoispoets.org/

MyLife

By Michael Lee Johnson

My life began with a skeleton with a smile and bubbling eyes in my garden of dandelions. Everything else fell off the edge, a jigsaw puzzle piece cut in half. When young, I pressed against my mother’s breast, but youthful memories fell short.

I tried at 8 to kiss my father, but he was a welder, fox hunter, coon hunter, and voyeuristic man. My young life was a mixture of black, white, dark dreams, and mellow yellow sun bright hopes. Rewind, sunshine was a stranger in dandelion fields, shadows in my eyes. I grabbed my injured legs leap forward into the future. I’m now a vitamin C boy it keeps me immured from catching colds or Covid 19. Everything now still leaks, in parts, but I press forward.

JesusandHow HeMustHaveFelt(V3)

By Michael Lee Johnson

Staggering out Wee Willy's dumpy dive bar, droopy eyes, my feelings desensitizing, confusing my avocado fart, at 3:20 a.m., with last night splash on Brut aftershave. Whispering to my outcast self sounding more like pending death. My body detaching from myself, numbed by winter's fingers.

I creak up these outside stairs to my apartment after an all night drunk, cheap Tesco's Windsor Castle London Dry Gin on the rocks.

I thought of Jesus how He must have felt during His resurrection dragging His holy body up that endless stairwell spiraling toward heaven.

MostPoems

By Michael Lee Johnson

Most poems are pounded out in emotional flesh, sometimes physical skin scalped feelings. It’s a Jesus hanging on a cross a Mary kneeling at the bottom not knotted in love but roped, a blade of a bowie knife heavenward.

I look for the kicker line the close at the bottom seek a public poetry forum to cheer my aspirations on. I hear those far away voices carrying my life away a retreat into insanity.

PoetsintheRain(V4)

By Michael Lee Johnson

All poets are crazy. Listen to them soak sponge in early rain medley notes sounding off. Crazy, suicidal, we know who they are: Edgar Allan Poe, Sylvia Plath, Dylan Thomas the drunk, Anne Sexton, Teasdale. This group grows a Pinocchio nose. At times I capture you here under control. I want to inspect you. All can be found in faith once now gone in time. With all your concerns, I see your eyes layered in shades of green confused within you about me. Forgive me; I’m just a touch of wild pepper, dry Screaming Eagle Cabernet Sauvignon, and dying selfishly. We don’t know if it is all worth it. I have refined my image, and my taste continues to thrust inside your crevices. Templates of hell break loose thunder, belches, and anomie. Asteroid Ceres looks like you passing gas, exposes her buttocks, and moves on just like ice on a balmy rock just like yours. I will wait centuries, like critics, to review this fecund body of yours soiled, then poppies, poetry in the rain.

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE:

DUFFY

Gavan Duffy writes poetry and short fiction. He is a member of the Scurrilous Salon writers group and has previously published in Crannog, The Stinging Fly, Poetry Ireland review, New Irish Writing, North West Words, The Stony Thursday Book, South Bank Poetry Journal, Bangor Literary Journal among others.

The artist has left me blind in one eye. The other he coloured a frail blue. I try to meet the stare, but it is looking behind me. He shows me sitting in the lap of a chair. My buttons struggle my hands fail to hide a modest crotch. My skin displays every mark it ever wore. Every stain and shadow every blush and bruise. My name no longer suits me. My teeth show under a withered top lip, milk shaped still but soured and hardened. I can't see my tongue, I imagine

it dry and frayed.

He has dressed me in clothes I would never wear. He has given me a ring. He has given me a watch. The numbers on the dial rise in decades the gold hands beg.

I can hear my heart not beating. I know I will never die. (Gavan Duffy)

Violation

This handwriting doesn’t smirk or cut corners. It’s all lazy loops and stooped spikes that have stopped in mid motion. The tails of some of the letters reach down to take tiny gulps from the lines below. Minute haloes float above some of the others. Stare at them long enough and the words become meaningless ,then pull apart into single units like musical notes scratched onto the page. I’d expected it to be a list of complaints, all of the recurring annoyances that dragged him through his routines. This was bitty, (that’s his word ,“bitty” the single horizontal stroke impaling the two letter Ts.) These were vague tailless sentences on half filled lines, with scavenged ideas waiting in the margins.

He sketches in places, fragments of chess boards a watery swastika , a curious eye. It changes suddenly with the first burst of melancholy ,

a whole page describing a single occasion, a lump of memory he scribbled down before it was forgotten again. Just as quickly it changes direction, goes wading through the mundane, reminding him of the phantoms of arguments and overcrowded silences. How it feels to be conjugally starved, and how so much of relationships are assumed or presumed, he’s unsure which. Every so often he feels his age, how the days fly by like almost worthless coins dropped in a trail behind you.

Suddenly there it is, circled in red and surrounded by crude asterisks, his naked little poem.

I will write this down and then forget it. I will ask myself why I always choose grey. Why its shades clutter my wardrobe. Why I sign with initials and hate the sound of my invisible name, and why this page becomes more exposed, as it’s clothed in letters stitch by stitch. (Gavan Duffy)

Peacocks

He tells me secrets. He tells me which colours hate to be seen. He tells me red is too guilty and gold is too vain. He tells me yellow is moody, and will cry itself away. His voice is flimsy, his hands molest each other. He steps back and asks do I hear him, asks are his dreams louder than mine. He kicks the shin of my chair, tells me that bruises heal in glorious hues. His grumbles continue like soft dismal prayer, he could say so much more in far fewer words.

He questions my answers, tousles my pride. Makes my name an insult, by snapping it neatly in two. It all turns morbid of course. He yawns and stretches, while I select a beauty from a pile of timid stones. We square off, swap coats and accents. He is first to leave, admiring his shadow as he steps into the sun. (Gavan Duffy)

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE: TERRY BRINKMAN

Terry Has been painting for over forty five years. Has Five Amazon E Books. Poems in Rue Scribe, Tiny Seed. Winamop, Snapdragon Journal, Poets Choice, Adelaide Magazine, Variant, the Writing Disorder, Ink Pantry, In Parentheses, Ariel Chat, New Ulster, Glove, and in Pamp le mousse, North Dakota Quarterly, Barzakh, Urban Arts, Wingless Dreamer, LKMNDS and Elavation.

Art by Terry Brinkman

Tran substantial the eldest surviving Queen

Infinite possibilities hither ghost candle moon

Monoidal symbolic maximum visibility at noon

Seated, engaged in writing drinking cold caffeine

Over dose of monkey shod self administered via canteen

Solitary hotel autumn twilight, at the lagoon

Such as never, Waxworks Modern Raccoon

Died on the evening hour before Halloween

Scheme of kinder Gardner Astronomical Kalel do scopes work

Kinetic temperament intuition Mother’s face puzzler

Preceding scene un narrated School years Skirt

Autumn twilight solitary hotel guzzler

Aconite liniment medical hall dirt

Scientific artistic pure science spiral muzzle (Terry Brinkman)

Sonnet CLXXXXII

Reduced pace bearing left relaxed on my Skates

Passed through the gap of the chains of electromagnetic

Spirit of women in literature affirmation poetic

Sirens enemies of woman’s reason to date

Adjoining paraheliotropic Jesuit education late Degiurtion certain chemical company sympathies

Obtruding influences of sexual synthetic

One point attributed to the reapportion of a mate

Her horse having reached the end of his burden

Three smoking globes of turds, running a museum

Sat in his seat near the end of Mount Joy Christendom

Less than the art subtends quarrelsome

Good bad or in different under the Railway Crematorium

Percy lived two different points of Platinum (Terry Brinkman)

Holy horror to face noodle kinda wily

A horse dragging the sweeper to mass crying Clear seas breeze bring voices of Sirens flying Making your acquaintance passionately by mail Distilling grapes into pothers of his riley

Steam roller lives are in peril tonight underlying Struck him ILK two identical names terrifying

A ship of the streets was brutes of the field lying

Virtues suffice, it to say sacred bulimic Spear pointed mescal whispered by wind flux Beckoning rang mescal brooding silence patronymic

In the Queen’s Chapter beyond the redux Vague loneliness of Souls metonymic Deep Velvet azure of the sky’s Benelux (Terry Brinkman)

Sleepy Whale 330

Her Bed Sheets made of silk

All wind and piss on the line move

Famine under her lip grove

Brogues pain ilk

Black north bilk

Gruff squire approved

Crucified stockings removed Alabaster silent she’s’ white as milk

Jess of sunshade Red

Making friends is everything

Such is life in an Outhouse Bed Ghost woman’s Queen Mottle affairs of spring (Terry Brinkman)

Three Corner Hat

Soft clinging three corner white Hat on her head

Her eyes giving way to tears red tired

Stole an arm round her waist before bed

Impetuous half kiss her soul is expired

Eyes color of Griddle Cakes with golden brown hue

Certain castle of sand front door to hide

Verge of tears too short sighted too see

Witchery bluest Irish blue lustrous lashes sight

(Terry Brinkman)

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE: MICHAEL BOYLE

Michael Boyle is a native of Lavey, Derry, Ireland .His poems have appeared in the “The Antigonish Review”. “ Dalhousie Review.” “Tinteain” and “New Ulster Writing.” He was awarded “The Arts and Letters” prize for poetry in 2014 by the government of Newfoundland and Labrador. Michael has also written articles for the Irish language magazine “An t Ultach. He is currently completing his first poetry collection “Whin Bushes from Drummuck.” In June 2017 he presented a paper in Magee College, Derry, on the Irish poet Seamus Heaney. In 2018 he gave a talk entitled “Echoes from the Barn Barrel.” to The North American Celtic Language Teachers Conference in St. John’s, NL. He currently lives in St John’s NL where he conducts a historical walking tour. www.boyletours.com

Memories of our old House

It must have been impossible for strangers to get to our house when years ago there were no G.P.S. devices. There was a train station in our local market town of Maghera, which was situated about halfway between Derry and Belfast. In a 1931 letter, a cousin on mine Patrick McKenna from Middleborough England described his circuitous hilly three mile journey in a pony and trap to get to Drummuck.

“There are two roads from the train station: one the main road and bending off from Mayogall the other the winding, badly metalled road up and down twisting about this was the road we took.”

Our thatched house was secluded away at the top of a steep stony lane. At the bottom of the laneway there were two lint dams, which were used to steep flax for several days. This “retting” gave a pungent smell to the whole countryside. In very frosty winter often we would skate on the dam making sparks our hob nailed boots From the road the lane went flatly and then suddenly to the left steeply for fifty yards at an angle of 50 degrees. If you stopped at the corner here you could have had a good view of the field to the road to Mooney’s and beyond that is Murrays Hill on the road to Maghera and in the distance the Sperrin Mountains. Across the road way was the home of the famous Lavey hurling legend Dan McCrystal.

As you ambled onwards up the brae on the your left hand side years ago you saw the remains of crumbling stones from the ruined wall steads, which were now part of a short dry wall fence which had barbed wire to deter sheep from escaping. A tall stately ivy tree grew half way up the hill lane and then at the corner there was once the mysterious sacred gentry bush. The lane veered a sharp left with “the well field” on the right sloping down to the moss and “the bungalow field” on the left. Both sides of the lanes were had tall hawthorn hedges

If you walked along another sixty yards and there was a spacious two story bungalow house where my Aunt Maggie and Uncle John lived. They were probably the last two Irish language speaker on Boyle’s hill .A semicircular sandstone pebble dashed wall, several ornamental glass balls and an elaborate iron gate were part the entrance to their house. In the front lawn were blackcurrant bushes as well as two white and green beehives. Davey Guess from Gulladuff came dressed up like

2

spaceman to collect honey from the hive at the end of the summer. We always enjoyed the sweet taste and the smell of the honey. As you went past the right corner there were gooseberries and red currant bushes. If you took another sharp right and then you would see the outline of farm out buildings. First old ‘Paddy O’ Neill’s dark grayish pig ‘cro’s’ (pig houses) then the ever expanding manure heap and in the distance the reddish rusty roof of the stable. A clump of bushes obscured a hidden entranceway, which had two six foot concrete pillars with rusting wrought iron gates. During the wartime these gates were hidden to prevent them from being melted for armaments. Over the years quite a number of young novice Boyle car drivers damaged these old pillars and now like the gates they are gone completely.

If you continued on for another seventy yards and you are now on our stony yard, which for some reason was known as a street. On the left was a small house for boiling potatoes and mixing pig meal and on the right “a cow tailed” helmeted pump situated almost at the gate to the sow’s field. At the bottom of the street was an open tall shed for storing hay bales. Swallows and bats occupied the top corner by building nests there. Often our small grey Ferguson tractor and trailer was kept here in this large shed.. The back door of our house took you into the farmyard through a back linhay, which at one time or other housed pet lambs and pet pigs

Our house had no entrance or doorway and you stepped right on the street. It had three rooms, a loft and a central hearth. It measured about thirty by fifteen feet wide with walls two feet thick. The house faced across the street to Drummuck moss with the infamous well and the old milk house where every fall black berries were stored in a large creamery container. Tall leafy ash trees, laurels and hawthorn bushes hid our view of the moss. The lane way to the moss was used to bring turf to be store in the shed for winter. During heavy winter gales the house rattled and shook as the winds intensified. Indeed strong windy gales often accompanied by heavy rain which never fell straight down but always at any angle. The windows were quite small a feature which dates back to an earlier time when taxes depended on the amount of sunlight coming into a dwelling.

The lower “good room” was rarely used except for American visitors, a station Mass or a visiting priest to say Mass.. I seem to remember that before visitors came, there was always a flurry of activity to spruce up the outside walls. They would be white washed with a lime dissolved in water and the bottom of the walls were painted black to make a trim three feet along the bottom. My mother hid Christmas toys in the lower wardrobe, which seemingly we never bothered with. However, there was the yearly mystery of what happened the missing Quality Street tin box of chocolates my brother Brian and I were the usual suspects.

The living room.

The house had one main open living area a kitchen a dining area and a work area. The table in the kitchen was placed against the front wall underneath the windowsill. I don’t remember any soft chair but only hard backed wooden chairs and a couple of sturdy three legged stools. There was a shelf for the wet battery radio that brought me out to outer space with Dan Dare and the Mekongs. And who could forget in the middle of night when my brothers and I were listening on the radio to boxing matches coming from New York between Rocky Marciano and Jessie Joe Walcott? We did mock boxing and this often ended in a real fight with one of my siblings. Then my mother came down to restore order and she got upset. She broke up the donnybrook by saying ‘’ Stop, Stop. In the name of God.” Then she uttered her prophetic warning to us all. ”Yees all will be separated soon enough.”

Beside the hearth was my pouting corner where I would sulk from time to time. We had a back pantry for keeping food cool and fresh. The churn for making butter was stored there. The upper bedroom benefited from heat from the central kitchen. There was lots of extra bedroom space in the loft and often at night you could hear rats scurrying along the thatch above the rafters. Opposing doors into the kitchen allowed for extra light. A half door had a dual purpose of keeping young children inside and wandering animals or fowl outside.

“This kitchen is like Grand Central station,” said my mother.

Everything happened there and everyone came through here. We had a large hearth fire with an over hanging crane, a crook for suspending pots and pans on the fire.

Sometimes crickets could be heard chirping at the side of the hearth and were always regarded as a sign of good luck. But when coal replaced turf the crickets disappeared. When we were all young there was an iron meshed four foot high fireguard to protect us from getting close to the fire.

My mother baked hot scones on the griddle. It was a real treat to have these with homemade butter and hot rhubarb jam. Dinner was always at midday as men worked in the fields and they always needed a big meal for energy. A big pot of potatoes boiled over the hearth fire. When it came to the boil the pot was strained outside and the steam from the hot water rose in the air like a huge vaporized cloud. We had an ample supply of potatoes all year round, but each spring we welcomed the fresh taste of imported new potatoes. On Fridays we had fish and especially herrings and you could smell them coming up the lane. We had plenty of cabbage, carrots and turnips. We grew kale to feed the animals. In our small kitchen garden beside the house my father grew lettuce, leeks, beets and parsley.

Each November year we killed and salted a pig for the winter. It was a terrifying experience and often we hid under the table when the pig squealed. We despised having a gruff amateur butcher come to the house barking out orders as he killed our pig in such a cruel manner. At first we loved the bacon but come April having bacon was no longer a novelty, as now it was so salty and less tasty. We churned our own butter and had buttermilk.

Sunday dinner meant a hen was cooked and the night before that we had soup on Saturday night. For many years Sean Tohill a butcher came from Maghera in a tiny black van selling roasts and sausages. For the Sunday evening we had a John West tinned salmon or a salad, which we called “rabbit’s dinner” because of the lettuce and tomatoes. Most morning we had brachan (porridge) and sometimes we had that dreaded yellow India meal as a sad reminder of earlier Famine times. Who can forget the smell of the Ulster fry of bacon, eggs and fadges completely soaked in gravy? On

New Year’s Day when Uncle Father Felix came we had fresh Irish lamb

5 and the pleasant aroma filled the house. My mother sat close to the fireplace to keep an eye on the hearth fire and this was her vantage point as an umpire ensuring that everything was in order.

With a family of eight children she always seemed to be cooking, churning butter, washing clothes, sweeping and struggling with the impossible task trying to keep a farmhouse clean. People trekked in and out from the farmyard with muddy boots.

Often she had just washed our red and blue tiled floor when this happened. My mother always seemed to be working and rarely had time for herself. An extra chore for her was looking after the hens and as we got older then we all took over that responsibility from. Later, I learnt that the money from the sale of eggs was really the only grocery money for the house that my mother had. At the same time I remember my father not having a secure wallet, but having a wad of white five pound notes in his back pocket coming from a fair if he had sold an animal.

We had no indoor plumbing and we had a special name for our outhouse to show respect to British democracy in Ireland. We called it Parliament House named after a HP sauce bottle with a picture of the house of Parliament in Westminster. We had no running water, but there were two wells on close to the street. We kept a rain barrel to collect run off water and often in the winter ice formed on the surface on the water bucket brought in overnight from the well. Being first up in the morning.

In May all through the night we heard ‘craik craik creek’ the forlorn cry of the corncrake coming from the scrog meadow. Then many times just after dawn the rooster’s crowing wakened everyone. When I was a young child I liked to be the first awake in the morning and I was really close to my father. I followed him everywhere singing and shouting as I went along. In summer I helped my father clear out the ashes from the hearth. Before going to bed the last chore of the day was to bank up the fire with slack so it never fully went out. In the morning you could stoke the fire embers with a few jabs from a poker and it would come to life. I can vividly remember coming down from

steep stairs from the loft singing this prophetic song 6

“Pride gets a fall we all know that’s true.” I heard this song in Miss Mooney’s classroom and I am sure I must have woken up the whole house Walking everywhere. Before we got our car we walked everywhere. During the week we trudged over the Moss and fields to Dreenan School .We even walked cattle long distances to markets in Kilrea, Bellaghy and Maghera I have been told in the early part of the century that cattle were driven to summer pasture in Lough Beg near Bellaghy. On Sundays we flowed the well trodden path up the Moss to the chapel at Mayogall and as we walked through the graveyard to Mass we passed some unique old headstones with many family first names that belonged to generations long past. For example names we encountered were Henrieus, Jacobus, Dionysius and Laurentis. So in a way just as hairstyles and fashion change so do first names. But I was growing up I really thought things never changed and the world stood still.

These are some of my memories from the old house. In 1953 my father had a new modern second story house built on ‘the well field’ about 200 yards from our old house.

(Michael Boyle)

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE: NOEL KING

Noel King lives in Tralee, Ireland. His poetry collections are published by Salmon: Prophesying the Past, (2010), The Stern Wave (2013) and Sons (2015). He has edited more than fifty books of work by others (Doghouse Books, 2003 2013) and was poetry editor of Revival Literary Journal (Limerick Writers’ Centre) in 2012/13. A short story collection, The Key Signature & Other Stories was published by Liberties Press in 2017. www.noelking.ie

Dadda’s allotment weeds taking over I drop a tear Stockholm forest the last hint of snow lurking in shades country parson bows his bald head in final prayer through shades of weak trees ozoned cancer shrivels a human skin wood worm slinking through the sideboard ruining our restoration flooding my ‘wellies’ river slows my pace a natural walk red and white suit entering a chimney the dog barks

showers powder the film set magic a hot white beach

clambering wings tear a red sheet from the clothes line (Noel King)

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE: FIONNUALA CURRAN

Fionnuala is a beginner poet, with a passion for all things imaginative and whimsical. She is a twenty four year old PhD student in quantum physics and a recent emigrant to Spain.

Bony Fish

Bony fish with glowing teeth Came dancing from the murky deep. Crusades of bees looked down to see Them rattle their cacophony.

Tale of a Snail

He never really left his shell, but he Felt their warmth from within it and Knew he was accepted, shell and all. (Fionnuala Curran)

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE: Z.D. DICKS

Z. D. Dicks is the Gloucestershire Poet Laureate Z. D. Dicks is widely published’

The Crooked House

(The Old Bell and Tiger’s Eye Restaurant)

Up a wide bunch of noisy woodwork in the warm of littered conversation you find yourself on a crooked floor sure steps, magnified by merrymaking

Where high darkened walls hum secrets varnished by centuries’ little marks so too, the solid mantlepiece cuts the bar in two, to demand attention There was what was, carved baby faces how they forever nested above the fire but this is what happens, I lift my eyes to optics past light broken through breezed windows

When songs are slugged, to match a mood drinks are lined up like museum pieces each with its own unique culture brought together only for delectation

All of the visitors are collected there

captivated by repetition, like priory echoes unified by an unmistakable blend of purpose in reverence for, simply, comings and goings

(Z.D.Dicks)

At the Cusp of Birdlip Hill

Haphazard patchwork reclined how fields were stitched in a jam centuries toiled by farmhands shaped and laid over hills

There at the top of a view roadways undulated lights a fire snake that crept slopes radiators billowed, a steading breath

In a wilderness between clearings every tall glimpse was minuscule travellers shrank in cadence as stillness juddered a procession

Onwards, past threaded trees solid walls, softened by weather odd angles curled around fields grass emblazoned yellow as rape

But in the space of no movement

uninvolved as a helicopter we were lifted in a change amid a mismatched landscape we took in each other, restarted depressed a clutch pleased at our own groundwork (Z.D.Dicks)

Hailes Abbey

There it was, submerged in grass where plant life had washed over as it felt like a miniature ornament in an oversized fish bowl

An abbey left to ruination, in theory but in practice a sacred monument a clear space of captured light always full enough to plunge in How archways were coastal bridges from one felled level to another where old stone furred up like moss bumps of tufts to mark boundaries

To dive is a strain upon modernity where broken breath allows a glimpse into a rock pool of carved recollection in waves, a way of living, out of reach

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE: JASON VISCONTI

Jason has attended both group and private poetry workshops. His work has appeared in various journals, including "Ink Sweat And Tears," "Valley Voices," "Literary Yard," "California Quartely" and "The American Journal Of Poetry." He especially enjoys the poetry of Pablo Neruda and Billy Collins.

The Situation Room

There is a circus swinging absent of the hands, Nobody knows the trademark of the tent, A clown makes policy through an imposter's paints, Juggling their torches they serve a crisis, And who can keep away the elephant.

(Jason Visconti)

When The Ocean Blushes

Sea fearing men react like a victim to a cheek, To touch a tide is to experience blood, The crease of a smile and the tide repeats, Brushing up your body the unsaid, Words can be a continent's close treats.

(Jason Visconti)

The First Toy Ever Made

Love just the object of a wandering wheel, Not the chemistry of other stuff, Alignment of the screw a kiss that’s sealed, An electric current carrying a laugh, A smile in the rules if you appeal.

(Jason Visconti)

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE: SHEEBA VARGHESE

Sheeba Varghese is a teacher of English at a British curriculum school in Dubai, and an aspiring poet. Her first poem 'The Walk', inspired by the temples in Bali, Indonesia, was published by Spillwords Press in 2021. She spends her time instilling love for stories and poems in children, and hopes to see her work on the shelves one day.

When we stopped holding hands

The floor was set in mahogany brown

With the silent chandelier hanging down Gushing over a yellow warmth as we danced, But the music ended when we stopped holding hands.

Rhythm, our turn style swayed with ease

To analogies of lovers who did as they pleased, Twirling in fantasies lived, and not plans, But the music ended when we stopped holding hands.

Did humdrum of the days seep in too deep?

Or was it the menacing race of life, Preceded by the ordinary slumbers and rants

That paved way for bereaved and yearning hands?

Was it then numbing or just a disquiet

When we moved on to other people and sights?

Or could it be, that we’re living in the angst

And memories of those perfectly entwined hands (Sheeba Varghese)

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE: R.W. HAYNES

R. W. Haynes, Professor of English at Texas A&M International University, teaches early British literature and Shakespeare. His poetry collections Laredo Light (Cyberwit) and Let the Whales Escape (Finishing Line Press) appeared in 2019. Another collection titled Heidegger Looks at the Moon came out in November 2021 from Finishing Line, and the same press will issue The Deadly Shadow of the Wall in November, 2022.

No Time for Sonnets

a]

Honor that old player, Aron Nimzovich, Whose best forays constituted blockades, Carpe diem, then, pull down the shades, Opportunity chokes when obstruction is rich.

Let there be no concentration, No strategy, wit, nor sophistication, Unleash the wild dogs of acceleration, Attack, attack, no hesitation.

Let laconic grunts say what you say. Baffle no sophomores who might shriek, “I understand nothing when you speak!”

Be the Muses’ bad boy Hemingway.

When these things shape poetic law The subtle sonnet quietly will withdraw.

b]

When you grow up hunting, out in the woods, I mean, not out on the plains, or in an SUV With four wheel drive, and flashy luxury, You feel the forest’s living neighborhoods And know the trigger’s nature is aligned With a quiet, massive symphony You must try both to hear and somehow see As sweet death murmurs to your heart and mind. Then comes the sestet, whether or not you score, You just walk home in silence, assured the game Was played with justice free of nagging blame, Played with a freedom needing nothing more. So we ask this, as hostile questions rise, What’s wrong with this well contrived surprise?

c]

You thought it was my move, but I disagreed, And there was no clock at hand to set us right, So was a gambit left there twisting in the night? Urged by sacrificial pride and need? Hovering somewhere there may be a blade Enforcing all the rules on the playing board, But neither of us greatly feared that sword The night that final game of chess was played.

(R.W.Haynes)

Shakespeare Turns Off the Squawk Box

Whatever that sonnet subtly did has passed, Like an old smile someone’s pensive mother smiled Remembering fondly antics of her child, Who never calls now but may call at last, Was there to please your curiosity, Awaken you with its erotic call, But it rang in vain, its gentle plea unheard, With all its measures fashioned uselessly, Released out there in empty space by me, Reaching forth for the consummating word. Ah, well, now this is surely what we do, As I play my part, always, you play you.

(R.W. Hatnes)

Dukes, Traps, and Jumps to Conclusions

“We don’t need alchemy,” Orsino grated, “All I want is justice. Come and take it. Nuts. I have not yet begun to fight.” Cesario smiled. “Your love is overstated. Do not take an oath if you must break it, Or stumble in darkness when you may wait for light.” “But ladies are different,” groused the noble man, “They gleam like lovely lilies with little sense And crave our low submission, high expense; If you knew them better, you would understand.”

“Γνῶθι σαυτόν, the Delphic slogan read, But who can tell what women have in mind? And why is it we men are always blind As devious Love lays treacherous traps ahead?”

(R.W.Haynes)

Erosion Management on the River of the Spirit

She thought that the ghosts that she once knew Had cut her off, that she somehow had lost Their friendship and would always face the cost Of that neglect, and that those days were through, But ghosts will often glide to hide away From dearest friends who count too much on them, While they still watch from shadows dark and dim, To lend their force when poetry’s in play. She reached for power somewhat cautiously And bumped awhile among our bumptious friends

As if to learn where exploration ends, But disappointment smiled and set her free. Those spirits, hidden well, sent inspiration, And freed her fine, acidic imagination.

(R.W. Haynes)

Shipwreck in the Desert

One works around the old joke, as the aches Multiply and lose significance, Dreams mainly discarding magnificence, As the web stretches toward the place it breaks, But never mind any of that right now, And youth, like vermouth, needs juniper More than rue, that scented conifer Easing passion into rest somehow. The youth of old discovery of new plains Stretches forth a feast of delectation, With spectacles of vast consolation Erasing memories that dragged sharp pains. But I will not say words that you expect: Some silence sits well upon the shipwrecked.

(R.W. Haynes)

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE: SUSIE GHARIB

Lemon

{A tribute to U2 The Edge}

Lemon, the colour of the sun when filtered through her closed eyelids. She wore lemon, lending every shadow a ray of light.

She’s going to make you dwell on many memories you left behind and when you remember, those fragments will reassemble, making you feel as if the gold is seeping into your veins, making you feel as if you’re holding on to her seams.

She wore lemon to enthuse your dormant dreams. She had seven candles of permanent beams.

A man weaves a kingdom with a fragile thread of words. A man breathes a throne so she can be at home.

A man spins a mantle with myriad metaphors to recollect the odes spun by the lemon she wore.

And these are the days when a song resurrects a face. And these are the days when we cling to a tenacious gaze.

Midnight is when the clock ticks within.

Lemon, she’s your inspiration, the tune born verse. May she thrive in Heaven, where she’ll be wearing her lemon.

TheLastKingofScotland

[A tribute to Forest Whitaker and James McAvoy for their great performance]

When a dictatorship with mania weds and Uganda swims in pools of blood, a slender Scot is hooked by the skin to die the most painful type of death.

Enchanted by the heroism of Scottish clans, by the tartan kilt and the proud bagpipe, he befriended the doctor who healed his hand to usurp his identity and turn him into a clown.

And though had he not been born a Ugandan he would have wanted to be a scot, he mocked the Celtic red hair and found its fiery gold disgusting.

Abandoned by his father as a child, he was adopted by the British army that made him servile, nurturing a scary General that had avowed to liberate both his country and Caledonia from the English crown becoming the last king of Scotland.

(Susie Gharib)

A Bubble

A bubble is blown by my overtired soul, so I creep, flesh and blood, into its impervious core, the safest shelter from an over demented world.

I walk the streets, now shielded from dagger looks, a censorious species whose tongues vie with vipers’ forks and feel like a ghost who’s been conjured up on an alien soil.

My dog trots beside me, elated by our ethereal stroll, we’re spared some frowns, some murmurs that we both abhor, revolving around the foul breath of a canine which contaminates her owner.

Some had opted never to shake hands with me, Others had refrained from walking on the same pavement. She had been allowed to lick a few hands and feet, but most were contented with contemplating a very odd scene, a little dog accompanied by a Ph.D.

(Susie Gharib)

Void

What’s this exodus of love, migrant hearts, leaving us denuded of brothers and sons, of sisters and mums, of that which warms each sequestered chest with feelings?

What’s this vast expanse of encroaching sands, that on our creeds obtruded, scorching our deeds, tainting beliefs, bequeathing an upheaval of dunes, protruding?

What’s this rain of locusts, out of focus, leaving our eyes deluded? Three visions of peace now all deceased by oracles who on our future sadly brooded. (Susie Gharib)

For Every

For every tear you made me shed, For every premeditated humiliation, For every step that you misled, For every aborted reconciliation, For every ache in chest and head, For every act of alienation, For every selfish whim you fed, For every lack of consideration, For every trap I narrowly fled, For every faked dedication, For every chuckle with which you tread Over my sorrow and desolation, A new thorn in your heart is bred, A new worm is in gestation.

(Susie Gharib)

A Fitness Walk

She bore your constant ridicule with her usual forbearance and fortitude, picking your jeers with a knife and a fork.

She bit into your pies of scorn, the middle aged woman, too old to own, a defiant trespasser on your marathon.

She munched your bags of hard shelled nuts: innumerable epithets for contracted whores, swallowing your bile with even strides.

(Susie Gharib)

Cherish

A restless cloud once grew very weary of roaming the illimitable welkin and inwardly yearned for a way of life other than fly.

She waved goodbye to a trail of friends whose troubled eyes fast filled with tears and sailed against a ferocious wind that tore so hard at resilient fleece.

She managed to sew her scattered yarn then anchored at a torrid sphere where an ailing cloud appealed for help, for coolness to ease that simmering heat.

She played the nurse until they grew too fond to part, too close to disperse and rained they did on furrowed land that received the drops with real glee.

She sought the bowels of the earth merging with streams that flowed unseen but soon grew tired of the dark and yearned for kites and flying fleets.

Her grief agitated every drop that tranquilly reposed underneath. The united waters began to gush through a crevice dug out by tears.

The flaming sun caught sight of her who eagerly bared her bosom to rays, then clambered up his ladder of light to be united with her peers.

In memory clouds frequently take this journey to the underworld. It helps them cherish every flake and every speck that roam the skies.

Why have we strayed so far from a path that's strewn with flowers? These thorns that prick our soles have sprung from hearts that cower.

We've waited so long for Spring at which past frost had glowered. Why do we shrink from songs that ring with a sun blest Summer?

I hold the love you breathed like flames that fear no showers. I dare each breath to heal long years of grief and sorrows. (Susie Gharib)

EDITOR’S NOTE

I apologize for the delay in this issue there has been a lot going on lately and time seems incredibly short, it hasn’t helped that my eye sight has been playing up. It turns out that one of the medications has been causing issues with my vision I’ve Glaucoma, its manageable and there is no permanent damage which is a relief but it has impacted on my ability to work as either an editor, a publisher or as an artist so a lot of things ended up delayed.

We are nowhere near finished with the journal and will continue to produce for as long as I am able, I am going to need to do a lot of work on the website in the near future and that’s going to be a time consuming process as I need to transfer all of the issues from the old website over as it no longer works properly and many of the issues that were on it have disappeared leaving nothing but broken links. I am also afraid that the hard copy edition saw its price go up due to costs by the printers and supply chain woes and that we cannot currently be read in several countries either online or in paperback that’s a shame and completely out of my hands right now.

Happy reading, good health, and keep creating,

Amos Greig (Editor)

‘IN A CHANGED WORLD’

Over the past number of years technology has transformed poetry publishing: shop closures due to increasing operational costs has had an impact, to put it mildly, shops are releuctant to take ‘slow moving’ genre such as poetry and play scripts among other minority interest genre. The figures given a few years ago were: we had 5000 bookshops in the UK Ireland and at the time of the research that number had dropped to 900 and falling: there was a period when bookshops had the highest rate of ‘High Street’ shop closures.

Lapwing, being a not for profit poetry publisher has likewise had to adjust to the new regime.

We had a Google Books presence until that entity ended its ‘open door’ policy in favour of becoming a publisher itself. During that time with Google, Lapwing attracted hundreds of thousands of sample page ‘hits’. Amazon also has changed the ‘game’ with its own policies and strategies for publishers and authors. There are no doubt other on line factors over which we have no control.

Poetry publishers can also fall foul of ‘on consignment’ practice, which means we supply a seller but don’t get paid until books have been sold and we can expect unsold books to be returned, thus ‘remaindered’ and maybe not sellable, years can pass! Distributors can also seek as much as 51% of cover price IF.they choose to handle a poetry book at all, shops too can require say 35% of the cover price, which is ok given floor space can be thousands of £0000s per square foot per annum..In terms of ‘hidden’ costs: preparing a work for publication can cost a few thousand UK £ stg. Lapwing does it as part of our sevice to our suthors.

It has been a well known fact that many poets will sell more of their own work than the bookshops, Peter Finch of the Welsh Academi noted fact that over forty years ago and Lapwing poets have done so for years.

Due to cost factors Lapwing cannot offered authors ‘complimentary’ copies. What we do offer is to supply authors with copies at cost price. We hold very few copies in the knowledge that requests for hard copies are rarely received.

Another important element is our Lapwing Legacy Library which holds all our retained titles since 1988 in PDF at £4.00 per title: the format being ‘front cover page full content pages back cover page’. This format is printable as single pages: either the whole book or a favourite page.

I thank Adam Rudden for the great work he has done over the years creating and managing this web site.

Thanks also to our authors from ‘home’ and around the world for entrusting Lapwing with their valuable contributions to civilisation.

If you wish to seek publication please send you submission in MW Word docx format.

LAPWING PUBLICATIONS

POETRY TITLES 2021

All titles are £10.00 stg. plus postage from the authors via their email address. PDF versions are available from Lapwing at £4.00 a copy, they are printable for private, review and educational purposes.

9781838439804_Halperin Richard W. DALLOWAY IN WISCONSIN

Mr.Halperin lives in Paris France Email: halperin8@wanadoo.fr

9781838439811_Halperin Richard W. SUMMER NIGHT 1948

9781838439859_Halperin Richard W. GIRL IN THE RED CAPE

9781838439828_Lennon Finbar NOW

Mr Lennon lives in the Republic of Ireland Email: lennonfinbar@hotmail.com

9781838439835_Dillon Paul T WHISPER

Mr Dillon lives in the Republic of Ireland Email: ptjdillon@gmail.com

9781838439842_ Brooks Richard WOOD FOR THE TREES

Mr Brooks lives in England UK Email:richard.brooks3@btinternet.com

9781838439866_Garvey Alan IN THE WAKE OF HER LIGHT

9781838439873_McManus Kevin THE HAWTHORN TREE

Mr McManus lives in the Republic of Ireland Email: kevinmcmanus1@hotmail.com

9781838439880_Dwan Berni ONLY LOOKIN’ Berni Dwan lives in the Republic of Ireland Email: bernidwan@gmail.com

9781838439897_Murbach Esther VIEW ASKEW Esther Murbach lives in Switzerland though she also spends time in Galway Email: esther.murbach@gmx.ch

9781916345751_McGrath Niall SHED

Mr McGrath lives in County Antrim Northern Ireland, UK Email: mcgrath.niall@hotmail.com

9781916345775_Somerville Large GILLIAN LAZY BEDS

9781916345782_Gohorry & Lane COVENTRY CRUCIBLE Mr Lane lives in England UK and due to the recent death of Mr Gohorry Mr Lane will be the contact for this publication: