A New Ulster 76

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

Featuring the works of Adrian Fox, Gerard Sarnat, Adam Millett, Gordon Ferris, Glen Wilson, Holly Day, Ray Whitaker, Paul Beckman, Fiona Sinclair, Michael Wrenn, Richard Halperin.

Hard copies can be purchased from our website.

Issue 76 January 2019

A New Ulster Prose On the Wall Website

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

Editorial Adrian Fox;

1. Belfast City Blues Gerard Sarnat; 1. Bleak Street Dickensians Adam Millett; 1. Nature’s Lot 2. Who Am I? 3. Sprongo 4. A Changing Universe Gordon Ferris; 1. Touch Without Touch 2. Summer/ Autumn 3. Storm View 4. Dark-Night 5. Possessed by Past Glen Wilson; 1. A Centurion Cleans His Blade, Antonine Wall 143AD 2. Johannes Shares a Secret 3. The Standard Gauge 4. Roehampton Cross Community Trip, 1997 5. Across the Water Holly Day; 1. Wife in Denial 2. Where We Meet 3. With Careful Hands 4. Unchanging More Fixed 5. I’ve Taken To Writing Suicide Notes Ray Whitaker; 1. Fresh Snow Paul Beckman; 1. Next Time We’ll Take Public Transportation

Fiona Sinclair; 1. Dream 2. You Ask Why I gave the homeless woman a tenner….

3. Not a monster then 4. Ritual 5. Nature’s Seconds Wil Michael Wrenn; 1. Forgive Me 2. Cold Reunion 3. Common Destinies 4. The Great and the Small 5. Elegy 6. Come away with Me, My Child 7. Reminiscence Richard Halperin; 1. Luna Moth 2. The Aspern Papers 3. The Pickwick Papers 4. Passus Means Suffered 5. For Edwin Muir 6. Light Itself On The Wall Message from the Alleycats Round the Back Ray Whitaker 1. Piedmont 2. Weymouth

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 “Bond� by Amos Greig

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

Editorial 2019 has been a rough start the poetry world has lost two of its brightest stars this month Padriac Fiacc whose work I’ve discussed several times passed away sadly around the same time his work started to get recognition again and Rachel Sutcliffe has also passed away after years of battling an auto immune disease her haiku and senryu were well respected and we had published her work several times.

These deaths have made me reflect on the passage of time especially the loss of family my cousin Stephen passed away this month after a year’s long battle against cancer he was diagnosed in 2015 at the same time as my father who was lucky enough but to beat it. I wasn’t able to attend his funeral that’s the third family funeral I wasn’t able to attend the first was my brothers back when I was a child and the other was my grandmothers I was at university at the time and couldn’t get permission to change the date of my exams. Those failures echo and I carry that guilt.

We have poetry and prose aplenty this issue from a range of voices and countries, A New Ulster has been mentioned in a recent survey of Irish literary sources that’s an interesting insight into how healthy the literary scene is here.

Last month I talked about the Pain Management clinic unfortunately I won’t be able to the pain management course in the new year after all. I’m using public transport due to my injury and while it is possible to get there I’d have to stay in Belfast for at least 7 hours due to the number of busses back home and the course itself takes up 2 and a half hours of intensive physio I was looking forward to it.

Onward to creativity!!

Amos Greig Editor.

Biographical Note: Adrian Fox

Adrian was born in Kent and his family moved to Belfast in 1967 when he was 6. He experienced the rioting in Ardoyne in North Belfast.

Adrian studied under Jimmy Simmons and has had his poems translated into several languages world wide. He has an MA in Creative Writing and has had work published in Poetry Ireland, Cyphers, Honest Ulsterman, Black Mountian Review, Poetry Guild and more.

He has produced the Violets with the folk singer Rodney Cordner as a tribute to those who died in the Troubles. Adrian also rteaches poetry online and can be contacted at http://adrianfox.org/contact.html

BELFAST CITY BLUES (Adrian Fox)

Fly on the wall documentary In the workshop of reality I create another poem I tinker with the epic tale of my confessional blues.

I am like the teletext that only gets half a signal.

My right side wants to move freely in any direction My mouth wants to talk a good show but it gets lost in a slur of incomprehension.

You can keep your sentimental views And your rose-tinted glasses. I want to watch This true-life drama in 3d from the comfort Of my wheelchair.

Belfast Imagine, Just past the sign that reads:

Garden of Peace There’s a sign that reads Hope.

Pitch and toss

Everything pops up at once The toaster, the kerb crawlers On my wheelchair, I drop The milk and run out of margarine.

I don’t know whether I’m coming or going?

Between art courses and hospital Appointments, loneliness and anxiety, This is a living hell, deciding.

I’m like a juggler During a balancing act.

I’m in a dilemma torn Between a half-life.

I toss the coins of my mind and two show up heads in the game of pitch and toss.

Belfast city blues That’s what happens at times like this you get lost. Jack Kerouac said: Write as if you’re the only person Left on earth.

Yesterday I may as well have been on a weather station watching out for forest fires in the middle of nowhere.

Flames licking the clouds of haiku.

I am a dharma bum

These are my are my Belfast city blues.

Second sight (Adrian Fox)

Repeat: ‘ any minute now some Thing will happen’

Chant it Like a chant until It’s part of your psyche,

Until It becomes The wisdom Of second sight.

The Bones and Feathers of Peace

I was reading the poems of Philip Levine.

I looked him up on the internet, and gasped My breath at the images of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

I’ll look at them tomorrow in the cold light of day.

I hope that my words will melt your view, like the Picture of the sake bottles, the distorted futility of war.

I remember seeing a film of Tony Harrison’s poem.

The Japanese were dressed in baseball suits Hitting a ball into the clear blue sky where The peace doves were pickings for the hawks.

Van Gogh (Adrian Fox)

Flicking through a book on Van Gogh paintings.

Seeing the subtle change of seasons from the master of movement.

Captured in the blooms of yesterday death in a vase of sparkled brilliance.

The light of grief, nature on the breeze.

A birdsong, the colour of sky filled with rain like Anton Chekhov foreboding.

The colour of light on an eye the tree, the sky and the ocean detail.

Biographical Note: Gerard Sarnat Gerard Sarnat is a physician who’s built/staffed homeless clinics as well as a Stanford professor/healthcare CEO. Gerry’s been married since 1969 with three kids plus four grandkids and more on the way. He has been nominated for Pushcarts plus Best of the Net Awards and is widely published beyond medical in academic journals such as including by Oberlin, Brown, Columbia, Virginia Commonwealth, Johns Hopkins, Wesleyan and in Gargoyle, Main Street Rag, New Delta Review, MiPOesias, Margie, Blue Mountain Review, Danse Macabre, Canary Eco, Military Experience and the Arts, Brooklyn Review, San Francisco Magazine, and Los Angeles Review. KADDISH FOR COUNTRY was selected for pamphlet distribution on Inauguration Day nationwide. “Amber Of Memory” was the single poem chosen for his 50th Harvard reunion Dylan symposium. Collections: Homeless Chronicles (2010), Disputes (2012), 17s (2014), and Melting the Ice King (2016). gerardsarnat.com

BLEAK STREET DICKENSIANS [5++] (Gerard Sarnat)

1. Don Of The Deal

Waiting for the Rolling Stones to arrive on stage, dour guy now genial after passing him our joint, his lady friend who gets my doobie next begins to spin out of school star struck joyous tales ‘bout current hubby’s mafioso connections which yada yada led to some fat contracts with one as yet unnamed mid-Manhattan muy muy mogul real estate developer absolutely renowned for routinely stiffing vendors’ final payments -- thus becomes that golden rule to always increase their first bill by thirty-five percent so in fact they actually were paid in whole apparently totally undetected by T***p Corp or its bully boy boss bragging how he pulled sucha deal off.

2. HAIKU [3] (Gerard Sarnat)

i. Noir

Seams in their stockings, dames furtively cook the books, mustard us all up.

ii. On A Hunch

After my mistress flattened me with flattery, I went home for lunch.

iii. Graveyard Can’t Cya

You and I are rust belt urbanites. These pea soup cities’re just tombs.

3. Bogarted Cache 22 (Gerard Sarnat)

Hid balled up there in Ma’s socks drawer

into our nostrils makes

to keep kids from beginning to vape

us so silliness blithered

THC cream which was purchased

neither one is capable now

to rub into her old-age arthritic

of figuring out what’s going on

thumbs that ached so damn

or exactly why wife plus husband

much that she couldn’t do

are in such a very strange situation.

any chores or even go to sleep, the Catch 22 is when osteophytes flare really badly fingers cannot unscrew lid to access magical salve

but worse than that briskly after we managed to finally pry open this invaluable jar a stout sweet smell of weed which wafts

4. WILLIE’S ALONE IN THE ATTIC [2] (Gerard Sarnat)

i. The Ghost Of Common Hamlet & Maybe Macbeth Banquo (Non)Sense

Variations on words most usually incorrectly attributed to her Shakespeare:

Hope against more disappointment, how much do we love our sonnets now?

Gerard Sarnat counts such + such ways keeping us at misunderstood gullets.

Don’t say darn it, vote early, vote often for Gesundheit Sarnatzky gibberish.

Oy veh, Robert or Elizabeth Barrett Browning would likely have deux cows.

ii. This Jerk Just Smirks Learning To Shirk Ropes He Talks (Gerard Sarnat) Jew used to go outside to absorb how forests or shorelines work when trying to write about them, but now I stay indoors where it is easier to remain naturally quirky

while at the same time exercising absolutely none except when running my MD mouth pronouncing to patients they must jump and jog -- if old, walk.

5. Going Both Ways (Gerard Sarnat)

Month back from Jerusalem’s Ben Yehuda St daughter’s fam stayed with her husband’s parents

as my grandson passed only test of concern to monolingual Iraqi Israelis: Can he communicate?

Liav now proceeds to remain in a liminal state of speech not quite sure how to toggle words

between English and Hebrew [I don’t know the slightest] while our toddler tries to teach me.

But since this American gramps is a total language clod, despite best efforts I mangle every attempt

which confuses him so that noble instincts to sheepdog all of us inner circle insiders in sync

melt into a mélange of sounds

neither fish nor fowl plus inability to please papa-abba who then blames

his schmuck father-in-law for mish-mashing our boychick’s fucked vocab toward dysfunctionality

whereby oy Liavy uses ?Gulam (Everybody) to describe toy trains, ?Da chad (Bring folk together) for buses.

Biographical Note: Adam Millett Adam Millett is a 27 year old poet from the west of Ireland.

His work is mainly influenced by the many issues and challenges facing the world today, and how we might address them. He also likes to explore the mysteries of our universe, and tries to find at least some form of sense in the deepest questions about life and its meaning.

He enjoys travelling the world and experiencing different cultures, and draws a lot of inspiration from conversations with people. The weirder the better.

Adam sees writing as his primary form of expression, and finds it allows him to organise his thoughts and emotions in a way that can keep him, somewhat at least, sane.

He feels a great sense of purpose when something he has written really resonates with people, and feels he can use writing as a sort of therapy, both for himself, and others.

Nature’s Idol (Adam Millett)

You are the mother that nature surely yearns to be.

You gave me life, and every day, more life you give to me.

All the love you provide and the light you create would make bright this dark world, if you guided it’s fate.

You are the mother that nature must strive to become.

If you set nature’s tests and helped out with its sums, I know all of these earthquakes and wildfires would stop with all creatures succeeding in one peaceful flock as you’d always provide and spread nothing but love, from the bugs to the humans,

from the hawks to the doves.

It is you who’s the mother this universe needs.

You would end all these wars, every mouth you would feed, every star would align, every demon would leave, everyone would know love, every soul would be freed.

It is you, my dear mother, who created my world, and it’s you who has toiled to make sure that it turns.

It is you who has taught me, it’s from you that I’ve learned that all life is worth loving, that all hate is absurd.

It is you my dear mother who has made me a man or at least strive to be the best one that I can, and if I ever become even half what you are, I’ll be greater than nature, and brighter than stars.

Who am I? (Adam Millett)

not my money not my job not my country not my god not my existential crisis cries that tell me I’m a fraud.

not my failures not my dreams not my habits not my genes not the thoughts that crowd my head nor all the things I think they mean.

not my gender not my race not my family not my face not my weaknesses or strengths nor all the cravings that I chase.

not my species not my time not my planet not my mind not the moral code inside

I feel is keeping me in line.

not the future not the past I’m not the first and not the last I’m not the answer to a question any person’s thought to ask,

as I’m the mystery of life, so who I am will stay concealed, until my journey comes to end,

and I stop writing all this spiel.

Sprongo (Adam Millett)

All the words are made up words, but some are made up wrong.

The word ‘nature’ for example is roughly defined as ‘The phenomena of the physical world collectively, excluding both humans and human creations’.

Wow. What a super silly word!

As if humans don’t come from nature?

I mean I suppose that would explain the almighty arse stained shit-show we’ve managed to make of the world.

But seriously though.

Humans are not considered a part of nature?

Like humans are composed of some special kind of matter?

Carefully baked at a different cosmic temperature than the rest of the matter in the universe.

Everything must have come from somewhere,

so why do we think that we came from somewhere else?

I mean aren’t we really just a bunch of slightly more advanced monkeys?

In the whole scheme of things?

Monkeys that have learned to play with slightly more advanced tools?

So why are regular monkeys still a part of nature but we’re not?

Do they stay a part of nature until they pass some sort of ‘artificial’ exam?

And then suddenly they’re not nature anymore?

Like as soon as a monkey loses the hair on it’s arse and learns how to make a few extra noises it suddenly receives a one way pass to the valley beyond what is considered natural?

And then everything it does or creates thereafter is considered above nature?

Or a beaver builds a dam and a human builds a house using trees from the same forest, but the beaver’s dam is a part of nature, and the human’s house is not?

No.

I’m not having that!

Just seems a little far-fetched to me.

Double standards or something.

Like nature’s the teacher but it couldn’t be bothered grading the more advanced assignments so it just gives them all automatic A’s and moves them to another class.

Nature.

What a lazy bastard!

So nature’s a bit of a half-arsed word then really.

Encapsulating only some of the stuff that exists.

Seems we need to make up a more substantial word then.

One that covers everything.

How about sprongo?

Sprongo is roughly defined as ‘The phenomena of the physical world, and any other worlds that may exist, collectively, including both humans and human creations’.

But that’s just a made up word you say?

All words are made up words.

But don’t worry, because all words are also a part of sprongo.

Everything, in fact, is sprongoral.

From the bacteria on our skin, to genetically modified tomatoes, to the buildings in New York, to the aliens we haven’t met yet.

No longer do we have to illogically discriminate between a beaver’s dam and a human’s bungalow.

A sparrow’s nest and an inuit’s igloo.

It’s all just a part of sprongo!

And sprongo brings us all together.

Even if some people do consider that unnatural.

A Changing Universe (Adam Millett)

With the limited evidence we’re able to use, looking back on existence I’m inclined to conclude that the balance of energy emitted to date has been stacked in the favour of masculine weight.

There’s been death and destruction on our planet alone, as the race to be Alpha and to get to the throne has resulted in brashness and violence succeeding while the more empathetic have ended up bleeding.

In our species the men were the ones that would hunt, using violence and killing to sort out the lunch, while the women went out and collected the berries, more at one with the nature that kept us so steady.

Like the sun when it sets on one side of our world, then its light on the other side starts to unfurl. A new set of ideas and energy wakes, and can try to absorb all the others mistakes.

In a similar way to our earth and our sun, where the balance will change when the daytime is done, could the universe come to the end of its night and wake up to its morning to show us the light?

If a feminine universe is what we would see, mother-nature prevailing with all her beauty, where the things we all needed were shared hand in hand, with no killing between us or destroying the land.

Would it really be possible for this to sustain, or would the light

from the day be too bright for our brains? Would we wither and burn in the heat of this summer, or finally learn how to love one another?

Biographical Note: Gordon Ferris Gordon Ferris is a sixty one year old Dublin writer living in Donegal for the past thirty six years. He is a member of the Dublin Writers Forum and has had poetry and short stories published in A New Ulster, Hidden Channel and The Galway Review.

Touch without touch.

(Gordon Ferris) Imagined touch in half-dream realm that calms the sting of nettle screams like reiki fingers gentle touch.

Recalling mother's caress of the ear plucked from memories schemes soothes our unseen fear and leads to restful sleep free of insane dreams.

Some touch you push to the back never to be uttered , once mentioned they become truth.

Touch above the skin enough to lift the demons then healing can begin

Summer/ Autumn.

(Gordon Ferris) Keep thinking of the things I love, When the sky above is clearest blue When all our senses come alive all our clouds disappear, from the hush of seagulls hovering above.

Keep thinking of the things I love, like early morning walks in whispering sea breeze When gentle waves ripple on Velvet sand And seashells echo the dolphins call.

Still thinking of the things i love The touch of sand caressing my bare feet.

See the smile on a stranger's face and fill my head with all around me Just enough to keep the quiet out.

Storm view.

(Gordon Ferris) Trees lean in the wind.

A piebald hides in the corner Out of the tempest.

Clouds overhead speak, Of neither night or day.

Birds scavenge for food, Some soar on the wind.

No man mad enough To venture out.

None to be seen.

Thunder in the distance The clouds anger venting, Merry men arguing.

The rain enriches the green And forms a pool in the field, Where a solitary duck rests Submerges it’s head, Shakes off the water Then departs gracefully.

Rising on the wind.

Dark-night.

(Gordon Ferris) Fragments floating through the air, Light transparent nondescript.

Nothing dreamt , can we depict, to help us stop this shrill despair.

Darkest skies on this, hallowed night From the depths of dreams Echo's the laughter and screams Of bonfires flickering light.

What path to be taken now Will it be water or will it be wine.

Or do you choose to back away and, bow.

Possessed by past.

(Gordon Ferris) This blackboard is blank, crying out for words to give it meaning.

A solitary foal stands alone in the middle of a field, it wonders, is this my place.

The sign with place name stands in a train station, wonders how this became its purpose.

Once upon a place in a backward time sat a man in a pose, possessed by a long-gone lover from a distant-ghostly past.

Does this all belong.

Is past and future moving over each other in defiance of what, We think to be real.

Biographical Note: Glen Wilson

Glen Wilson lives in Portadown with his family. He has been widely published having work in The Honest Ulsterman,

Southword and The Incubator Journal amongst others.In 2014 he won the Poetry Space competition and was shortlisted for the Wasafiri New Writing Prize. He won the Seamus Heaney Award for New Writing 2017.

His first collection of poetry will be coming out in 2019 with Doire Press.

Twitter @glenhswilson https://glenwilsonpoetry.wordpress.com/

A Centurion Cleans His Blade, Antonine Wall 143AD (Glen Wilson)

The dead are left, some with eyes open hoping to still see,

sometimes there isn’t enough coin in the world to blind us to ourselves.

I wipe thick sweat from my brow, my muscles still pulse with adrenalin

though the battle is over.

I let my arms hang by my side and gladly chance to ache.

I run my blade through the grass, red with life, wet with death.

I look up slowly out over the fallen horizon, remnants

of men still fight within their bodies, acceptance comes

both hard and easy.

Comrades’ hunch over friends, tears fall

behind duty-dented shields, banners speckled with one colour.

I lower myself unto a mound of disturbed earth,

and think now not of victory but of the cost.

The image is fresh —my enemy lying prone awaiting the iron —

death and myself caught in the reflection of his eyes

Johannes Gutenberg shares his secret (Glen Wilson)

I watched how the press turned a few dark grapes into words copious,

swelling into a flood, movable type that stains well.

Everyone will savour it on their native tongue,

lips repeating what they have read straight into their neighbours ears—

I’ve tasted and it is good, it is so good.

The Standard Gauge (Glen Wilson)

Excuse me Sir can I see your ticket?

He punches holes quickly and moves on.

You and I shadowboxed with each other, glancing blows that no one else saw.

I fold and unfold the pink receipt, trace the edges of the holes punched through.

When it eventually happened I learned much, not everything that looks like love is love,

This Train is for Belfast Central, Calling at Great Victoria Street, Botanic...

I know I told you not to wait at the station, I wish I hadn’t - but then I see you waving –

But no it isn’t you, just someone dressed like you smiling at someone else, their world aloud.

Roehampton Cross-Community School Trip 1997 (Glen Wilson) London will always take you in, leaving the rest of the world both smaller and bigger.

Our paroichal squabble seem so quaint here, this city that homes nations, quartered in streets, consulates, cornershops.

I see union flags on mugs, T-Shirts, tea towels and often sold by immigrants, some tracing their arrival back centuries, others only starting to pick up the tongue.

It makes Ulster seem feint, our speech bubbles burst by the babble of new accents and in those voices new choices ideas we hadn’t considered, scales drop from our eyes.

There is freedom for hands to find knees where the teachers can’t see, hormones don’t discriminate, horizontal is the peace accord!

Stripped of our uniforms we could be the sweet sowers of history.

In student halls we sat circled, protestant, catholic, planter and gael, head girls, alpha males, undefined futures but futures.

Well-meaning facilitators pass a candle around, lighting wicks and the possibility of better fires, little realising that something new was already smouldering.

Across the Water (Glen Wilson) The owners had left on Mountjoy’s footing, the crops a waste, the livestock thin, burnt buildings still warm in the roofing, celtic cross stones racked with sin.

But I have resurrected the walls, clove through the rotten harvest to ferment the soil for the next seasons haul, drove fresh cattle from our ports. They augment, better the native breed, birth something new.

I send part of my wages back across the sea, to your mother and a sister you never knew, they wait in the town of Stranraer for me.

I will send for them soon, a life can be made here, even among the turret spikes.

We have spread quite far from the quay, claiming with ploughshares and hired pikes.

I was proud of how you stood up to the crossing, gripping my hand before remembering you were among men, took one step away, planting feet on the berth deck, a world beneath you moving.

The rain falls often here, it feeds the green.

I strike deep down in the clay, the cut, the sluice of disturbed soil, a change seen and unseen, turning fallow to a glut.

You are placed near a birch bough on the foreland so you can be a guidepost for your Mother.

Taken mid-plough by Ulster’s severed hand; disturbed mounds, turned one after the other.

There are many Isaacs’ resting now in the shades for no one spoke to stay Abraham’s hand.

The others are still out there, nursing poor blades, But I have sowed my seed, it is taking root where I stand.

Biographical Note: Holly Day .

Holly Day’s poetry has recently appeared in The Cape Rock, New Ohio Review, and Gargoyle. Her newest poetry collections are A Perfect Day for Semaphore (Finishing Line Press), In This Place, She Is Her Own (Vegetarian Alcoholic Press), A Wall to Protect Your Eyes (Pski’s Porch Publishing), I'm in a Place Where Reason Went Missing(Main Street Rag Publishing Co.), and The Yellow Dot of a Daisy (Alien Buddha Press).

Wife in Denial (Holly Day) I hear the screams from the bedroom imagine her staring back at me with wide, blue eyes but it doesn’t do any good.

I tell him to pick up after himself when he’s done I’m not doing the laundry this time, either.

I hear the conversations coming from the room afterwards and I know it’s just him, it’s him speaking in two separate voices his and hers, and it is nothing I want to know about.

I walk above the corpses I know are in the yard lightly careful with my garden spade, avoiding any fresh-turned dirt sprinkle wildflower seeds over the suspicious mounds instead.

Where We Meet (Holly Day) In bed, in the dark, your fingers brush the jagged “x� that marks my damaged past.

I flinch out of habit, force myself to be completely naked with you tell you how you can make a happy face with a lighter home-poke tattoos with a safety pin and India ink.

I trace the pattern of your own damaged flesh, ribs shattered and warped, a mangled child written in pages of skin half-crumbled to dust ritualistic burnings—here, I defy you to tell me I had it bad, we had it bad.

With you, I stand in defiance of the past remake myself in images of celibacy angelic visitations, with a heart as pure as ice.

With Careful Hands (Holly Day) her body a thin shadow beside the pool the next morning a whitewashed backdrop, too thin ankles and smooth pale legs small. slashing and sewing with careful, tiny stitches she lies peacefully on white cotton sheets no one would ever know.

Unchanging More Fixed (Holly Day) I am a ghost invisible I am quiet and cold here in the dark I am becoming nothing I am becoming his hand moves across me and I grind my teeth trying not to feel people meet my gaze as I walk down the street it all falls inside me shrinks to nothing falls right through me shrinks to nothing push down the memories ball them up and hide them in place I am becoming nothing nobody notices as I hide in the dark nothing nothing nothing nothing

I’ve Taken to Writing Suicide Notes ( Holly Day) I’ve taken to sleeping naked at night dreaming terrible lies beneath these stained sheets-we meant something, we mean something, you were just passing through.

There are places in me you can never see.

I’m practicing my handwriting, where the trembling comes in sprawled out on the floor for invisible cameramen to trace me in chalk, just walk away.

I’m losing my mind with you inside me you can never go, memories, no.

Biographical Note: Ray Whitaker

With two books of poetry to his credit, “ACKNOWLEDGEMENT: Poems From The ‘Nam’ [212 pages, 03/2015], and “23, 18” [90 pages, 10/2015]; Ray has been writing poetry since he was seventeen. Holding a Bachelors in Music Education, Ray has been living and writing creatively since college. Ray is a member or the North Carolina Poetry Society, and The North Carolina Writer’s Network. He has twice been a 'Writer-In-Residence' at Weymouth, Center for the North Carolina Arts and Humanities. He is currently doing readings at the fine independent bookstores that carry his book around the state.

FRESH SNOW (Ray Whitaker) There is now a pristine beauty.

White expanses belying the lawn’s buried grass beneath no footprints tracking, just a quiet freedom from the journey.

That expanse appreciated as if this was the way it was always supposed to be.

Stretching, reaching from end to end as an unpainted canvas.

In the days of my youth this fit that which was always what should be: unspoiled, the crisp view of a spotless expanse.

Then when a dog, or a deer, ran through it… seemingly a transgression in seconds, changing permanently the survey.

Now my big white puppy-dog leaps with joy in all amongst the yard’s unbroken white.

Pure delight apparent just in leaving tracks.

Biographical Note: Paul Beckman Paul Beckman is an award winning writer published in print, online and audio magazines worldwide. His stories are in numerous anthologies. His stories can be found from Playboy to 50 Word Stories. Paul’s published story website is www.paulbeckmanstories.com and his blog can be found at www.pincusb.com

Next Time We’ll Take Public Transportation (Paul Beckman)

We landed ten minutes early at New Haven Airport. Our only luggage was carry on so we hustled over to the car rentals and Hertz told me our car wasn’t back yet and it might be an hour or so. Cancel it, I said and went to Budget and they had either a two-seater rag top or an SUV, both at the same price.

We took the luxury SUV keys and went about the lot looking for it and it was a brand new Lexus, washed and ready to go. I opened the back door to put my carry-on in and there was a grandmotherly-type woman sitting there knitting.

Excuse me, I said. You’re sitting in our car.

That’s okay with me. I’m no trouble and you won’t have to make any special stops for me.

I’ve got a strong bladder.

That’s not the issue. We paid for this car and we don’t want to share it with a stranger.

I’m Althea, she said. Now if you both tell me your names and something about yourselves we won’t be strangers anymore.

Did you get granny dumped by someone?

I don’t know what that is but my son-in-law took me out this morning, bought me breakfast at Denny’s, and then brought me to the airport and told me to find an unlocked car and sit in the back and not to bother anyone.

Well you can’t stay her. Please leave.

I can’t do that.

The wife gets in the car and sees the old woman, “Did you have to pay extra for granny here?”

I walked back to Budget and told them about Granny and that I wanted another car.

We’re all out of cars and Granny won’t bother you. She carries her own snacks and has a strong bladder.

That’s not the point, I said. If I can find another car from a different company I’ll return the keys and want my credit card info back.

So your mom and I left the airport in the Lexus and were heading for our hotel.

I need to stop, Granny said.

“What about your strong bladder I asked her.

I have to go number 2 she said.

We pulled into a gas station and I got out and asked for the keys to the bathroom. You have to purchase something the attendant said so I bought a large bag of chips and two cans of soda. I took the key that was attached to a small anvil and walked back to the Lexus and told Granny to hurry up we had places to go.

She snatched the key and opened the car door and kind of ran towards the bathroom. I started the car, grabbed her knitting and drove over and tossed her bag in front of the bathroom door.

I went to drive off and she was standing in front of the car so I went to back up but there was a car behind me.

Granny tucked her knitting under the front wheel and went into the bathroom. I got out and tried to pry it loose but by the time I did she was back and sitting in the car. We drove off heading for our hotel and decided to stop at Pepe’s Pizza for lunch. Just as the pizza came two cops walked in and asked if we were driving the Lexus and I said yes.

The lady in the car said you kidnapped her from the airport.

I explained the situation and invited the cops to sit and join us for pizza. They did and one took the hot pepper flakes shaker and coated the top and the other did the same with the parmesan cheese.

When we got outside I asked the cops to take control of Granny but they said I had to bring her back to the airport. We drove back to the airport, parked the car in the Budget lot, gave them back their keys and called an Uber.

It was near the airport and we should wait out front I was told. Ten minutes later the Lexus pulls up with an Uber placard in the window and Granny’s driving. She pretends she doesn’t know us and I have a panic attack as she opens the trunk so we can put our bags in..

Biographical Note: Fiona Sinclair

Fiona Sinclair lives in Kent . Her seventh collection Time Travellers picnic will be published by Dempsey and Windle press in March next year. She is the editor of the fledgling magazine from the edge .

Dream (Fiona Sinclair) Sometimes in the mind’s own virtual reality, you run into an old friend who turned foe after a falling out; and achieve the forgiveness that in real life is as impossible as Arab- Israeli reconciliation.

Unwilling to step over the threshold to wakefulness, you hover in that hinterland , where collaboration with the subconscious may prolong this dream. Here you return to your friendship’s sweet spot of coughing fit laughter, catholic chat from clothes to Coleridge. Here too show off your fortune’s hand brake turn; fella and foreign travel.

Make plans once more for girls’ own theatre trips and teas; until, full consciousness bustles in, degrades the dream to fantasy.

You ask why I gave the homeless woman a tenner…

(Fiona Sinclair) When dad died mid mad renovation projectsurveyors’ reports were brandished in mum’s face like rap sheets, until one buyer bought the cottage for a steal.

Our come down then from ownership to a place in the council house queue, waiting for contacts to pull strings.

Mum and gran in the same small house would react like hydrogen and chlorine, so a friend offered an old caravan tethered in an orchard. Mildew décor and damp bedding; mother’s It’s an adventure cheeriness was eventually washed away by sobbing November rain.

Decamping to a modest hotel, she pay-phone pestered for progress, on the new build bungalow promised her, on the nod.

Fixed Marilyn smiles to family and friends, that father had left us better provided for so, could afford this a la carte living, in truth, our savings were an upturned hour glass.

When mum paid her beauty’s trump card, the council officer licked his lips, offered tea, Don’t mind sharing my cup, do you? inferring What’ll you do for me intimacy in the future.

Despite inwardly gagging, her smiles made promises she would slam the door on once the keys were in her hands.

Today in city centres, homeless in card board kennels are constant reminders that fate can stick its foot out and send you crashing to the streets, to be set about by yobs as post kebab sport; in day light shoppers, workers give them a wide berth as if skirting giant turds; I too scurry past, averting my thoughts from. Majority are youngsters or older men, but she is middle aged like me, tucked up in a redundant doorway her eyes cast down like an untouchable, as she rotes Spare some change.

Laden with gifts, bloated with afternoon tea; I know that for now the scales have tipped in my favour, so I scoop the tenner off the bottom of my bank balance.

Her automatic Cheers in expectation of change’s chink, then she double takes the note, our eyes meeting in unspoken collusion that she can treat herself to the good stuff later, her Thanks pursues me like a heckle as I scuttle away. Now I suspect another motive behind my charity; it was an offering to appease fate.

Not a monster then.

(Fiona Sinclair) I attend this psychiatrist in more cubby hole than waiting room. Pondering how Freud can cure pelvic pain.

After 4yrs of Maudsley forensically examining my past, I am zipped up as the hand bag on my lap at prospect spilling my mind’s contents again.

But he is a clairvoyant’s tall, dark, handsome promise, augmented by confidence loosening charm that would make him an ace blackmailer.

There in that room, snug as a confessional, I yield my tin man secret; over looked during CBT years when too busy making sense of my other spaghetti thoughts.

Only recognised by me post therapy, but even on tipsy girls’ nights out when Anne Summer’s secrets, husbands’ failings, prosecco pour out, I cannot share my Estella affinity, for fear friends would take a step back.

His explanation is matter of fact, love is not hardwired, parents must teach.

Dad, AWOL amongst farmland and knocking shops, mum buying time from bailiffs with her beauty, meant drawn bow atmosphere at home.

His wrath at my sloppy hand writing, Her slap happy at my untidy bedroom.

My eureka ‘Of Course’ as suspicions that I was sociopath, wicked, freak are suddenly exorcised.

We will work on this: he prescribes a dozen appointments for starters, which I later cancel, remembering my mother grief overdosing when love of life left, friends decked by husbands’ punch in face infidelity, so, prefer to keep my emotions on this low burner just enough to give homeless girl a tenner, listen patiently to pals’ plaints.

Then, as always, you time your entrance just right.

I am Gung- Ho grabbing life after illnesses’ lengthy sentence.

First dates I insist we go Dutch, making it clear I am not to be bought for the price of a coffee; but read ‘’Dinner next week?’’ as having definite hanky panky subtext so because you are not my Mr Rochester, Mr Gatsby, Mr Darcywrite Dear John email; you query my semantics, Now or Ever? then take a punt and suggest no strings friendship.

Truth is I always smile at the sight of your emails, find my mouth droops if you miss a day, and our dates spike an otherwise flat line week.

So, arms crooked linked becomes peck on cheek,

becomes hugs until Christmas Eve you go home baring parcels and a surprise gift that puts a grin on your face.

Now, when you pay She’s stunning accolade to some other woman, the thought of you betraying me seppuku stomach rips.

As another chum checks out, driving back from the crem you suddenly instruct I want born to be wild at mine, and panic mobs me.

Then I know that I have staked more than friendships liking-

Ritual.

(Fiona Sinclair) Over time you evolve a nightly ritual: snuffing out the table lamps then standing in the TV’s uncanny full moon glow watching the last dregs of the news whilst eating a carefully quartered pear.

You let slip; that having always dwelt by the sea, initially my rural village seemed landlocked as the Midlands, and moving in to my home of some twenty years, you felt like a lodger with benefits.

But suddenly one night, during this putting the lounge to bed observance, you experienced a sudden Dunromin epiphany.

Hearing this, I feel rather as if you have with- held a health scare from me, until it was sorted.

Nature’s Seconds (Fiona Sinclair) If I had longer arms, I’d be a stripper.

We share the joke like a joint.

I think there might be a niche market for crip porn Always up for converting your handicaps into assets you have already researched, but are not sure if you could fake sexy, still, an option should a bruiser of a bill loom.

What with my disorderly body ‘s two fingers up to medical science, and yours failing to fully unfurl in face of second generation thalidomide deniers, we both regard our bodies as nature’s seconds, attention seeking with their repertoire of symptoms, miser mean with pleasure, So, we will not be sorry to shrug off…

Biographical Note: Wil Michael Wrenn Wil Michael Wrenn is a poet/songwriter who lives in rural north Mississippi, USA. He has an MFA from Lindenwood University and is a songwriter/publisher member of the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP). His work has appeared in numerous publications, and he has published a book of poems. His website can be found at: http://www.michaelwrenn.com/

(Wil Michael Wrenn)

Forgive Me Forgive me if I seem a bit uneasy when I talk about the not-too-distant past…

Forgive me if I seem a bit downhearted; I’d like to say that I’m okay and that I’m over you – Forgive me, but I can’t.

Forgive me if I tried a bit too hard to make you love me; forgive me for telling you so foolishly and with such a tactless flair that I loved you.

I was young and, I guess, a bit naïve to believe in happy endings, though in the movies it seemed to work out just like that – all so right, all so fair.

Forgive me for believing in tomorrow when I couldn’t even count on today; forgive me for believing you would love me and insisting it would always be that way.

Forgive me if it seems that I avoid you…

It’s not that I hate you – it’s just that I can’t face you.

Forgive me, for, you see, every time I look at you I’m reminded too much of me and all the anguish that I’ve gone through.

And oh, yes, one last thing before I forget: I hope you’ll forgive me for saying this, too, although you may have trouble believing that it’s true; I mean, after all this time it couldn’t possibly be that I could still love you – well, forgive me… but I do.

(Wil Michael Wrenn)

Cold Reunion On this late-October night with the full moon shining bright, here we are again – reunited, In a manner of speaking, beneath the vastness of star-filled skies and a wide expanse of tall pines.

But the only thing left to help me remember you is a cold, gray, tombstone at the head of your grave.

I wonder…

Are you any happier there than you were here, happier than I am now? — I truly hope so.

Part of you that once felt so warm to my touch, lies deep in the earth, alone, with eyes closed, seeing, feeling nothing…

The cool, green grass growing silently over you.

And I stand above with my eyes open, yet seeing, feeling nothing (too benumbed to even think) …

The cool, green grass trampled thoughtlessly under my feet.

There’s an idea that’s very tempting to me at this moment: I could almost be persuaded to join you there if you could but tell me, convince me that you are indeed happier than before, at peace and at rest – But you cannot, and thus I’ll decline…

For the time being, anyway.

But why so somber?

I’ll return… someday to go where you have gone (and far too soon, I know).

And until then, I’ll come here every day to this place where the green grass grows cool and deep,

covering you while you sleep, and as the daylight ends and the darkness descends and the pines, like sentinels, seem to close in, while the night comes quickly but quietly on, in silence I’ll stoop low to lay fresh-picked flowers, gently, beside your stone.

(Wil Michael Wrenn)

Common Destinies Equally bored and lonely in our everyday lives, you and me, because of what has been decreed – the supposed best thing for both of us.

Meeting for only a brief, fleeting moment on our roads to nowhere (each one leading to a different nowhere), we paused to ponder the meaning of it all, finding little solace there and no solutions‌ only what we saw within each other: a pale, flickering light of love – lost love, a love unrekindled by faith or hope or dreams, but a love made all the more desirable by sorrow and sadness and loneliness.

We tarried there a while

at the convergence of our roads to take stock of our common lives and our common destinies – so closely united yet so far removed – and then we parted, something less than lovers, something more than friends.

(Wil Michael Wrenn)

The Great and the Small Why should I be this amazed and taken aback by youth?

I've always believed the smallest thing reflects the largest truth-It's just that it strikes me as being very odd that now, after all these years, the thing which moves me most to tears is when my little niece-innocent, trusting, and kind, not burdened by the world's woe, not knowing of the world's wrong-out of a simple act of love, brings to me a carefully chosen flower which she has picked especially for me.

Oh, dear God above!

Would that our faith were half so strong!

Would that our eyes could be so blind!

(Wil Michael Wrenn) Elegy Laughter rides on weary wings And rings through canyons of my mind; Crying brings back broken dreams, Familiar things I’ve left behind – Voices… faces from the past…

I knew then they would never last.

Sighing, realizing fears, I sympathized with all their tears.

Rainbows told them colored lies While sadness settled in their eyes.

Lightning, slashing, slits the sky – I wonder why all life must die…

Flying, sometimes I can see A glimpse of how the end must be…

I’m falling through my mind’s debris; Death drowns out my desperate plea.

Rivers roaring in my head Are filled with all the silent dead; Sorrow, playing games with Chance, Rolls in on waves of Circumstance Crashing hard against the rocks – The key is lost that opens locks.

Dreamers, dying in the dust, Watch their teardrops turn to rust,

And nearby I stand looking on, Wondering where my life has gone, And then the truth returns to me – Death is all men’s destiny.

Somewhere there’s a scraggly soul Sitting with his sacred scroll.

He’s paid the price for dreams he planned; His paradise is made of sand.

I heard it said a dreamer died, Alone, with no one by his side…

He was a prophet, too, I now – I knew a prophet long ago.

(Wil Michael Wrenn)

Come Away with Me, My Child

Come away with me, my child To fields of wonderment; We’ll run, we’ll play, We’ll laugh and sing Before the day is spent.

We’ll think not of the transient hours, The day that’s growing old; I’ll watch you, and I’ll make believe You’ll ne’er forsake the fold.

But even as we share the sun, The night is drawing near, Forcing me to face the truth – Alas! I cannot hold you here.

Although I love you, little one, I have to let you go; You must be free to seek your dream And find your own rainbow.

But why should I feel such regret And why a prick of pain? – For once the babe has flown its nest, It won’t be back again.

So, come away with me, my child, To fields of wonderment; We’ll run, we’ll play, We’ll laugh and sing Before the day is spent, Before the day is spent.

(Wil Michael Wrenn) Reminiscence The wind blows cold across the lake-I think of you.

The chill seems to penetrate straight to the very marrow of my bones-I remember you.

The crystal clear water, like a giant mirror lying on the surface of the earth, reflects the slate blue sky above-I picture you.

The trees catch the muted rays of the sun...

The waves ripple...

The leaves rustle...

I divine your presence here-wistfully.

Biographical Note: Richard W. Halperin Richard W. Halperin is an Irish-U.S, poet living in Paris. His collections are published by Salmon and Lapwing. The most recent are, respectively, Catch Me While You Have the Light and Tea in Tbilisi, both 2018. He can be seen reading eight poems on the UCD Irish Poetry Reading Collection archive, YouTube. He agrees with the gist of a 2008 Irish Times Article, 2008, by John F. Deane, entitled 'The Death of Poetry,' which is - paraphrase - You, dear readers of this article, are the death of poetry if you don't part with a few quid and actually buy, regularly, poetry magazines or poetry collections; and not just for yourselves but as pressies. Mr Halperin adds, 'a good poem in a magazine, or a good collection, has fished me out of the pond more often than has a good steak, and has cost me a good deal less.'

Luna Moth (Richard W Halperin) ‘Only by acceptance/Of the past will you alter its meaning.’

The Cocktail Party

I was stupid with a friend, and wrecked The friendship. Years later I thought maybe I had only stunned it. I made a first move, And we are friends once more. Why do I Write this, when Eliot already wrote it?

Because there is a beauty in acceptance Of the past. Because its meaning can be altered.

What does meaning mean? Nothing which there are Words for. Sounds, perhaps. The sound of A seashell when one holds it to one’s ear.

The sound is in it, on the beach, whether Anyone picks up the shell or not.

We, the friend and I, in the pyjamas Of old age, hobbled toward each other Before the designated restaurant On the rue Soufflot. Something of stupidity Let go was among the debris. We smiled.

The Aspern Papers (Richard W Halperin)

Every time I reread The Aspern Papers It eats my flat.

A young American publisher crazy as a coot.

An old woman of tremendous force.

Her niece who by tale’s end has broken every bone of the story.

Venice.

There are some writers, Especially if one writes oneself, Who make one feel like a chimpanzee..

The Pickwick Papers (Richard W Halperin)

Outside, the monsters are destroying again.

Inside my tent are some poems and The Pickwick Papers.

I must leave the tent to help my brothers and sisters.

I am not armed, but this is no battle, It is the human brain separating again Into its component parts. Where are my friends?

Dead or not, they are in me, while I am.

Beauty is the DART rounding a bend in Wicklow.

Sugar Loaf looks a perfect cone, a protective presence.

Up close, it is neither a cone nor perfect.

A mountain. One kind word, or one betrayal, Can shatter it, as probably has happened many times.

Whoever can know what takes place on the inside?

Only God is good, the rest is incomprehensible

Passus Means Suffered (Richard W Halperin)

Christmas morning 2016.

A homily heard years ago in Paris – Cardinal Lustiger – comes back: Christmas Starts with the Annunciation and ends With the slaughter of the innocents.

That this is what is born, that this is what One is born into. Many innocents Are being killed this day, indeed every day.

Light, colour, took you whom I loved; you plural; So many of you, who are not here This morning. You were not killed; but.

Asses were probably in the stable, Their soft eyes, their strength. Hooves, feet, paws – Not much difference among these.

Not much difference between houses and stables.

Things happen.

For Edwin Muir (Richard W Halperin)

Let us steal a peeling: on the gold dome Of Les Invalides, on the very top, A gold cross. A man made it, other men Sweated it in place, it there so that Louis Fourteenth or was it Thirteenth, as well as Each wrecked invalided soldier, could see it, One hundred years before Wolfe Tone’s escapade.

Who was that man? There’s the gold cross. On it The gold guts of a gold man. Who was that man?

Who was that tree, now part of earth eighteen feet Below Jerusalem? They all played their parts And are their parts: the man, the cross, the tree, Wolfe Tone, Mad George Third or was it Fourth, The gold guts pink and soft which ooze onto The hands of the centurion from him who Is street anarchist or teddy bear or Conscious son of God. Domes are for peeling, Or we deserve the history we get, in which Everyone but we remains invisible.

Things blur. Everything that ever was Is in the blur. Shakespeare wrote beautifully Because he thought beautifully. Has anyone Ever noticed that?

Light Itself (Richard W Halperin)

Places in Ireland deserve precision.

In Joseph Woods’ Monsoon Diary They get it. And in Burma as well.

I do not know how he does it. Sunday last I walked with a friend on Sandymount Strand.

Evening. July. Low tide. Sand, sea, clouds, Sky, the entire east, were beige. Beige And silver. For almost an hour God Did beige. Luminescence. I cannot Go further. The poem stops here.

If you fancy submitting something but haven’t done so yet, or if you would like to send us some further examples of your work, here are our submission guidelines: SUBMISSIONS NB – All artwork must be in either BMP or JPEG format. Indecent and/or offensive images will not be published, and anyone found to be in breach of this will be reported to the police.

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January 2019’s MESSAGE FROM THE ALLEYCATS:

We Alleycats cannot believe that it has been 6 years since we started this journey we’ve experienced some losses and health issues along the way but we’re still here. Several of us have crossed the Rainbow bridge since then. 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”.

Biographical Note: Ray Whitaker With two books of poetry to his credit, “ACKNOWLEDGEMENT: Poems From The ‘Nam’ [212 pages, 03/2015], and “23, 18” [90 pages, 10/2015]; Ray has been writing poetry since he was seventeen. Holding a Bachelors in Music Education, Ray has been living and writing creatively since college. Ray is a member or the North Carolina Poetry Society, and The North Carolina Writer’s Network. He has twice been a 'Writer-In-Residence' at Weymouth, Center for the North Carolina Arts and Humanities. He is currently doing readings at the fine independent bookstores that carry his book around the state.

Photo Credit: taken winter of 2016, Olympus EP-M2, near my home in the Piedmont of North Carolina

Photo Credit: Shot at Weymouth North Carolina Center for the Arts, Olympus EP-M2 on tripod.

2016

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 https://issuu.com/amosgreig/docs/anu_women_s_anthology_2017