Anu presents voices for peace

ISSN 2053-6127 (Online)

Featuring the works of Lorraine Caputo, Michael Whelan, Marcus Strider Jones, J.S. Watts, Paula Matthews, John Byrne,Al Millar, Jack Grady, Kevin Higgins, Barbara Gabriella Renzi, David Atkinson, Amy Barry,Marion Clarke , Helen Harrison and Amos Greig

Voices for Peace Anthology December 2015

A New Ulster On the Wall Website

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

Editorial

page 5

Lorraine Caputo; 1.

Peace Flag

2.

A Thousand and One Nights

Michael J Whelan; 1.

2.

3.

4.

Prospects for Peace Pristina Beirut On This Beautiful Day

Marcus Strider Jones; 1.

Resist, And Dance, Remain 2.

Somewhere in France 3.

We Move The Wheel 4.

Lothlorien J.S. Watts 1.

2.

Broken Parts March Past Replacing Helicopters with Buzzards

Paula Matthews; 1.

Bullets John Byrne; 1.

Who Helps a Mother 2.

In Whose Name Al Millar; 1.

‘Peace’ – I’m Not really sure what that means?

Jack Grady; 1.

Resurrection 2.

Bosnia at War’s End 3.

Two Refugees

Kevin Higgins;

1. After Paris, Friday 13th

2

David Atkinson; 1. Abercorn 2. fallujah birthdays 3. nature poem 4. museum of the welsh soldier Amy Barry; 1. Still flickering in the darkness Marion Clarke; 1. Haiku Helen Harrison; 1. After the Drought Amos Greig; 1. White Rose 2. Spasms

Barbara Gabriella Renzi; 3. Pace

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Manuscripts, 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 Digital distribution is via links on our website: https://sites.google.com/site/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 “Peace March� by Barbara Gabriella Renzi Photography by Giulio Napolitano

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“There are no strangers here; Only friends you haven’t met � Yeats.

Editorial This is a special edition produced in response to the wave of violence, which has swept across the world this year. Peace seems like such a far away goal at this time and the year is nearly over there are dozens of religious holidays coming up and yet we seem to have not learnt from the violence of our past.

I felt that something had to be done even if it was just a small gesture a means to show that there is more to this world than bloodshed and hatred. Mass shootings in America, the divisions in Syria and the constant bombings and internecine strife, kidnappings by Boko Haram, attacks in Mali, Paris, Israel and Palestine and of course on the streets of Belfast my home town.

It is almost depressing however I know that there are people working on the ground to bring about peace, who bring communities together and who show that there is another way. There are mass outpourings of support and care for many people for the homeless and the refugee.

Christmas is a time of giving so thanks to all of the poets who supplied their voices for peace I present to you this issue. No matter your religion or lack thereof we are all human, we bleed the same colour and have the same hopes and dreams so I present this issue and ask you to share the message far and wide.

Enough pre-amble! Onto the creativity!

Amos Greig

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Biographical Note: Lorraine Caputo Lorriane is a documentary poet, translator and travel writer. Her poetry and narratives has appeared in over 100 journals in Canada, the US, Latin America, Europe, Africa, Asia and Australia, as well as in eight chapbooks of poetry and twelve anthologies. In 2016, dancing girl press will be published her collection, Notes from the Patagonia. Lorraine has also authored several travel guidebooks. In March 2011, the Parliamentary Poet Laureate of Canada chose her as poet of the month. Lorraine has done over 200 literary readings, from Alaska to the Patagonia. For the past decade, she has been traveling through Latin America, listening to the voices of the pueblos and Earth.

Several of her poems had appeared in Nยบ 8 (May 2013) of A New Ulster.

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PEACE FLAG (Lorraine Caputo)

Time and place shift with a smell or a rooster calling Again I am walking earthen roads through the mountains & puna I am sitting in the dim of an adobe home hearing her & his story weaving through our space

They capture on these weavings of my pen

across this space

wrapping us together in a warm human blanket

That scent

that song

& so I soar over emerald jungle green along sapphire seas & pearl shores 7

The strand I gather weaving weaving our Spirit whole

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FOUR THOUSAND AND ONE NIGHTS (Lorraine Caputo) A young woman returns to this bomb shelter The other women & children gather ‘round to give her dried fruit & tea Her small hands, her dark eyes tremble as she recounts to us Almost trapped in the open she was afraid to move Fearful that, then, the tracers would find her I swallow her bitter words The pin of my head scarf pricks the tender skin of my chin What is the best thing to do if one is caught like that?

I ask Don’t move & read the Koran the women tell me But I don’t know Arabic Just hold this copy of the Koran Allah hears prayers in any language My long dark sleeves brush the small dark-green book placed in my hand

Dream time & dream place shift The bombing began again we huddle outside a building’s door & as soon as we can we slip in huddling 9

praying beyond the grimed glass façade The rain of munitions now is constant no respite Gold streak after gold streak after gold … after …

They paint disappearing lines through our clenched eyelids We clench each other tight this old woman & I Our headscarves touch Gold streak after gold & the white flashes of their explosions so near us Our breath silent explosions of fear to move will find us Fear to think even a complete thought Tracers Gold streaks We dare to lift our heads just a bit to talk Tracers Tracers Gold streaks white flashes Tracers tracing I don’t know what to do I whisper Just keep still & pray Tracers tracers tracers tracing

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Gold streaks painting white flashes burning clenched eyelids Our bodies clenched in a tight embrace My hand clenching the small green book How I wish I could read even one prayer my mind whispers How I would like to read just one ‌

Dream time & dream place shift

Darkness deathly stillness No tracers We run low to bushes in the middle of the road Afraid our movements be detected Deathly silence darkness & we run low to a glass façade Slipping through the doors Down the silent darkened corridors 11

Our footsteps sharply echoing & left down another corridor towards a light burning the darkness Towards lighted rooms where the women & children where shelter, dried fruit & tea await us

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Biographical Note: Michael J Whelan Michael J. Whelan is a soldier-poet, writer & historian (Curator – Irish Air Corps Aviation Museum) living in Tallaght County Dublin. He served as a United Nations peacekeeper with the Irish Army in South Lebanon and Kosovo during the conflicts in those countries, which informs much of his poetry. He was 2nd Place Winner in the Patrick Kavanagh Poetry Award 2011, 3rd Place Winner in the Jonathon Swift Awards 2012, shortlisted in the Doire Press and Cork Literary Manuscript Competitions and selected for the Eigse Eireann/Poetry Ireland Introductions 2012. His work has appeared in the An Cosantoir, Hennessy New Irish Writing, Poetry Ireland Review, the Red Line Book Festival and many other literary magazines and newspapers. A number of his poems appeared most recently in The Hundred Years War - Modern War Poems anthology edited by Neil Astley and published by Bloodaxe (UK) He has published two books The Battle of Jadotville: Irish Soldiers in Combat in the Congo, 1961 (2006) and Allegiances Compromised: Faith, Honour & Allegiance - Ex British Soldiers in the Irish Army 1913 - 1924 (2011). He was awarded an MA in Modern History from the National University of Ireland (2006) and an Arts Bursary for Literature from the South Dublin Arts Office in June 2014.

To sample his work visit michaeljwhelan.wordpress.com/

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PROSPECTS FOR PEACE (Michael J Whelan) The rubble hospital delivers a dead new-born baby into the hands of a doctor of history, who studied conflict resolution for his Ph.D. thesis somewhere in the West before volunteering as a teacher in a school in Palestine for a nine month period, when the war intercedes and demands of him his views on the prospects for peace when the New World Order is finally adopted by the nations of the Earth.

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PRISTINA (Michael J Whelan) It was only a moment but he looked into me.

Could see me as clearly as I see him after all this time, his eyes piercing my soul, digging deep.

I’m at a main junction in Pristina, my jeep is turning left into the raging river highway near the barracks flattened by NATO bombers a few months before.

I’m counting satellite dishes that seemed to over populate the high-rise landscape overnight, ‘a sign of normality at last perhaps?

The rusty orange car catches my attention.

Starting and stopping in a crazy fashion, like a piece of farmyard machinery that hasn’t seen a road in years, fueled with kangaroo juice, its driver on the loose.

I caught his eyes then, as he lay across the back seat. The agony in his face as they reached out to me and I saw what remained of his leg. The ball of his knee hanging, attached by loose skin and gristle and wrapped in a bloody white shirt.

The drivers took control then and sped in opposite directions. I couldn’t help him but I know he sees me, like I can see dead people.

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BEIRUT (Michael J Whelan) Under a halo of shells, safe in the wide open arms of hell, she considers the prophecies, (the burning buildings, the smell of smouldering tyres and charred bodies).

She longs to conquer her own future, walk tall under pine trees, breathe in the Hyacinths and pick the Damask rose.

ON THIS BEAUTIFUL DAY If a fireball momentarily sucks air from the windows on the inside of a packed rush hour bus, where people seconds before looked out upon the market places of Televiv and Beirut and you are watching in the future on your TV from somewhere in the world, water hoses cooling the cinders of a city street much like yours, the particle faces of commuters being scraped from walls and sewers then you are , like me, the lucky one having nowhere to travel on this beautiful day.

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Biographical Note: Strider Marcus Jones Strider Marcus Jones – is a poet, law graduate and ex civil servant from Salford, England with proud Celtic roots in Ireland and Wales. A member of The Poetry Society, his five published books of poetry http//www.lulu.com/spotlight/stridermarcusj.... reveal a maverick socialist, moving between forests, mountains, cities and coasts playing his saxophone and clarinet in warm solitude.

His poetry has been published in the USA, Canada, England, Ireland, Wales, France, Spain, India and Switzerland in numerous publications including mgv2 Publishing Anthology:And Agamemnon Dead; Deep Water Literary Journal; The Huffington Post USA; The Stray Branch Literary Magazine; Crack The Spine Literary Magazine; A New Ulster/Anu; Outburst Poetry Magazine; The Galway Review; The Honest Ulsterman Magazine; The Lonely Crowd Magazine; Section8Magazine; Danse Macabre Literary Magazine; The Lampeter Review; Ygdrasil, A Journal of the Poetic Arts; Don't Be Afraid: Anthology To Seamus Heaney; Dead Snakes Poetry Magazine; Panoplyzine Poetry Magazine; Syzygy Poetry Journal Issue 1 and Ammagazine/Angry Manifesto Issue 3.

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RESIST, AND DANCE, REMAIN (Strider Marcus Jones) your alluring love recurring elated sated eyes soften me with sighs that wake the blood to pump and rise underneath my hood. the darkness combines and defines us into one completeness in this mass bleakness. i hope we cut the chains of chance, when we join the crowds in Spain and Franceto resist, and dance, remain.

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SOMEWHERE IN FRANCE (Strider Marcus Jones) loving you is my violin playing four seasons, constantly withinmelodic notes. walking through each interval is integraljoined tangents turn to jokes. affection bonds the spectrum of experience to existence in our senses standing without fences we gypsy dance somewhere in France.

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WE MOVE THE WHEEL (Strider Marcus Jones) we move the wheel that turns through each mistake, giving motion to the roles we chime until both trickle out of time like brittle steel that rusts and breaks into lapsed devotion. less, or more, you imagined it was sure sharing the road with you, treading under dark, grey and blue sky, wondering where it went going to unfold in fates wind blowing fondling your full face to some top-to-bottom place. we have moved the wheel, only to reveal our high Metropolis is still the same Acropolis of extremes and obscenes spreading gangrenous genes. we have separated Dream from Time and live in mirages like Bacchus and Libera duped in an era condoning crime, altering the images of it's illustrious self stealing the wealth of massed, divided synergies.

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LOTHLORIEN (Strdier Marcus Jones) i'm come home again in your Lothlorien to marinate my mind in your words, and stand behind good tribes grown blind, trapped in old absurd regressive reasons and selfish treasons. in this cast of strife the Tree Of Life embraces innocent ghosts, slain by Sauron's hosts; and their falling cries make us wise enough to rise up in a fellowship of friends to oppose Mordor's ends and smote this evil stronger and longer for each one of us that dies. i'm come home again in your Lothlorien, pursuading yellow snapdragons to take wing and un-fang serpent krakkens, while i bring all the races to resume their bloom as equals in equal spaces by removing and muting the chorus of crickets who cheat them from chambered thickets, hiding corruptions older than long grass that still fag for favours asked. i'm come home again in your Lothlorien 21

where corporate warfare and workfare on health and welfare infests our tribal bodies and separate self in political lobbies so conscience can't care or share worth and wealth: to rally drones of walking bones, too tired and uninspired to think things through and the powerless who see it true. red unites, blue divides, which one are you and what will you do when reason decides.

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Biographical Note: J.S. Watts J.S.Watts lives and writes in the flatlands of East Anglia. Her poetry and short stories appear in a diversity of publications in Britain, Canada, Australia and the States and have been broadcast on BBC and Independent Radio. She has published four books: a full poetry collection, "Cats and Other Myths" and a multi-award nominated poetry pamphlet, "Songs of Steelyard Sue", both published by Lapwing Publications and two novels, "A Darker Moon" - dark literary fantasy and “Witchlight” - paranormal fantasy, both published in the US and the UK by Vagabondage Press. A new poetry collection, “Years Ago You Coloured Me” is due out from Lapwing Publications in 2016. Further details at: www.jswatts.co.uk

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Broken Parts March Past (J.S. Watts) This, the song of broken parts, may be hummed to the march tune of your choice.

By a quick one, no two, brave boy; don’t let that leg stump break your stride.

It is a theme for any time or season but is tuned to the months heavy with the fallen, waiting for the drop of russet and gold to cover the fresh dug earth with chestnut palls and fig leaf yellow.

Take this eye patch, lass, to keep the sand out of the socket.

I use two myself, saves turning a blind eye.

Focus only on the major notes, the gleam of self importance in that polished sense of worth.

Respect the uniform, not the chap who wears it.

There’s no harm, my son, in losing an arm if your long, empty sleeve is always worn with a tie, top button clenched shut to keep those thoughts in place.

You could see yourself in these shoes if you had your eyes or any feet left.

Hat squarely on your head when out of doors until it’s blown clean off, that is.

One family, one body, one tune to step out to, one, no two and while I’d like to feel your loss all empathy got cut off 24

in the drilling and the bashing and the sharpened shiny tones of the brass notes’ clarion call.

Still, there’s no shortage of raw parts that’ll polish up nice and fresh before they’re broken and ground beneath the timeless drum roll and the pride of the march.

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Replacing Helicopters With Buzzards (J.S. Watts) I had become almost used to the gyratory throb and roar gulping the air above the house as the choppers routinely trooped past, hovering low over my roof seemingly close enough to snatch the suddenly vulnerable chimney pot before continuing their straight-line flight to somewhere militarily important.

The slicing of their untired blades mechanically cleansing the nearby sky of the naturally winged.

Winds blow by. We are all, allegedly, the poorer now.

Feeding austerity, the soldiers packed up their kit bags old and new and left; the barracks mothballed in their slipstream.

Across the empty sky spread above my roof, the hollow mew of the buzzard calls out now.

Steady feathered fingers reach towards the chimney, but do not touch.

The buzzard is intent on the fields behind the house, hovering to snatch a rabbit, or other small creature, living and dying out there.

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The heavy beat of large wings clearing the sky of smaller birds.

What do I know, but a sky full of buzzard wings strikes me as a better world than one booming with rotor blades.

Yes, the helos make a strength I benefit from and young men and women die for me to keep my peace.

A world of wide blue skies and broad green grass seems a precious peace to me.

Though the rabbit may think differently.

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Biographical Note: Paula Matthews

Published poet and playwright Paula Matthews is currently editing The Launchpad, Creatively Directing Marginal Theatre and training as a theatre director via the Arts Council Northern Ireland. Mentored by Moyra Donaldson and Jo Egan, she published her first children's book this year and has decided to be someone who brings voices from the margins into the centre of her work. She thinks peace is more precious than rubies.

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Bullets (Paula Matthews) (For S and D on the occasion of people posting bullets through your door.)

I’d take them from you and melt them down.

Dissolve the bullets, discard the deadly gun.

Not so rigid now, they could shape-shift.

Forge a bullet-chrysalis, insides transformed for flight.

Fly far from your door.

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Biographical Note: John Jack Byrne

John(Jack) Byrne lives in Co. Wicklow ,Ireland he have been writing for almost 6 years mainly poetry Traditional and Japanese short form and have had some published success in UK , USA, Ireland in Anthologies, Magazines ,Ezines /Journals http://john-isleoftheharp.blogspot.ie

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Who Helps a Mother (John Jack Byrne) Who helps a Mother as she weeps in the dust who affords her protection when the sword is thrust

Who hears her cries when she’s all alone for all her dead children who will atone

Once she had loved ones jewels of her heart then a bomb from the sky ripped them apart

She calls on her god for a reason why he choose to do nothing and allow them to die

Who helps a mother distraught in the dust what hope for tomorrow when her god she can’t trust.

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In Whose Name (John Jack Byrne)

Is not the sky for all of us and the clouds that float above what was the word he left us not killing or hate ,but love

Was it not he who calmed the sea and raised a friend from the dead why do you use his name to kill and not evoke it for good instead

A day is coming when answer you must you with the bomb and the gun It is no God but evil you serve no salvation for the deeds you’ve done.

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Biographical Note: Al Millar

From Donegal, lives and works in north Antrim.

Loves English language used well. Keen interest in Scots vernacular poetry in Ulster. In 2014, edited with biography and introductions 'Frae the Causey to Apolaypse' the poems in Ulster-Scots and English by John McKinley of Dunseverick. Enjoy writing poetry and prose in English and vernacular, and both together. Outside of literature hobbies include climbing hills in Antrim, Donegal, in fact any beautiful hill anywhere, also politics, and eating nice food.

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‘PEACE’ - I’m really not sure what that means?

By Alan Millar A poem written specifically to submit to Voices for Peace an Anthology, organised by A New Ulster, in the days following the November 13 2015 terrorist attacks in Paris and other atrocities in Beirut, Nigeria and Mali.

For some reason after sitting down to write, My initial thoughts on ‘PEACE’ focused on what I believe ‘peace’ is not ‘Peace’ is not some wanky one liner posted in a comely swirling font By people who don’t seem ultimately very ‘peaceful’.

Or elevating your own world view into a presumed and righteous paradigm Waiting for the one who contradicts this to be the ‘peace breaker’.

Two of my pet hates about ‘peace’ I confess!

But no, that was the wrong approach.

Be positive!

But how?

I suppose I could divide ‘peace’ into ‘personal’ and ‘collective’, Offering a sense of the personal ‘inner peaces’ that I have known, Celebrating how much better these were than those painful states of distress or turmoil, And suggesting ways of encouraging more of these ‘moments of peace’ In myself and others; Rising above any burrowing angers, fretting or pettiness, Using my good sense, intuition or experience!

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Or do similar for the collective, Perhaps starting locally, Sharing memories of where our ‘divide’ was transcended By diverse collections of individuals focused on modest yet noble goals, Who won small victories for humanity and community – YES! In the often bleak public landscape created by Ulster’s petty sectarian war!

Reinforce the point with a swing of the facts That those with diametrically opposed political and cultural views Could have soured the lot with hateful tension, But chose instead to be ‘peaceful’, Because of good sense, kindness, convention or whatever!

Moving on, I could suggest us as a metaphor For a world cleaved apart by religion and politics; For something infinitely bigger, wildly more terrible, Point the finger at these stone their own, murderous, fanatical iconoclasts Who claim the inner ‘peace’ of Islam, But are not ‘peaceable’ people.

Then flag up for balance, and I suppose ‘peace’, Europe’s wealth and colonial past, our legacy of holocausts and mandates!

But then it gets far too huge and abstract, And the ‘do not tar all with the same brush’ point not even made yet, As it very forcibly must be made in these circumstances!

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So it’s back to personal again!

Maybe my travels in pre Daesh Syria Years ago, after crossing the border alone from Turkey, I found the ordinary Muslim people to be hugely hospitable, Leaving positive memories of individuals briefly met Imad George on the train to Aleppo, who liked western radio; Or the quirky village pharmacist who for some reason called Bulgaria – Bulgarry; Or the friendly young men who showed me around a coastal town, (They had hand guns, true, but don’t Americans love bearing those too?)

(And who are we to talk in Northern Ireland anyway?); Or watching Syrian holidaymakers out for a evening stroll, Wearing too many clothes for a Mediterranean beach, especially the women!

The scene seemed old fashioned, or something like that, Different just, but very pleasant.

Or drinking tea with four brothers, When I witnessed the most profound thing ever Their mother seated herself on the floor in the middle of us all, With a small basket of wheat, Just enough for a loaf or two, And began intently checking every grain, flicking grit to one side wheat to the other, A scene unchanged in thousands of years, I thought.

‘It’s beautiful’ one of the brothers told me after, looking out across the countryside.

‘Yes’, I said, but it was too dry and rocky for me.

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Travelling is brilliant; it leaves you more at ‘peace’ with difference, And it stays with you and is sharable.

Finally, to the point Somehow reconciling ‘peace’ with the indiscriminate slaughter of innocents, In Paris, Beirut, Nigeria, Mali and other places?

Including “Beirut, Nigeria Mali and other places” along with Paris, Contributes to ‘peace’ I am sure.

Though I am compelled to state as a European, That we have to protect and defend ourselves, Our homelands and peoples!

Not an attitude with any natural philosophy of ‘peace’ built into it, I admit; One that, sadly, could ultimately even mean war – I hope not!

But necessary given the circumstances, I think.

But don’t blame the refugees, they are fleeing these philistines!

Land invasions and carpet bombing won’t work, despite what the hawks say; Is there not a cycle here? The West invades, loses the political will after a decade, Then withdraws, Leaving countries more volatile than they were before?

In trying to articulate my disquiet at the wave of very un-‘peaceful’ Often highly militant reactions to the Paris attacks, 37

On social media, and by some political leaders, I produced the following ‘Peace is complexity, war is simplicity’ ‘Understanding is complexity, anger is simplicity’ I was trying to trumpet in a positive way, The folly of the furious simplistic reaction!

But I saw, and not even immediately, That all I had, Was a couple of ‘wanky one liners’, and not even that original, Though not as yet attired in fancy font and posted!

This subject is too big for me really; I don’t know its dimensions.

Though I’d say that there’s more ‘peace’ in me having tried to say something Than having said nothing at all.

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Biographical Note: Jack Grady Jack Grady is a founding member of the Ox Mountain Poets, based in Counties Mayo and Sligo, in Ireland. He is a past winner of the Worcester County (USA) Poetry Contest, and his poems have been published in Ireland, the United States, France, and the United Kingdom, including such literary journals as Crannog,Poet Lore, A New Ulster, The Worcester Review, North West Words, and Mauvaise Graine, among others, as well as in And Agamemnon Dead: An Anthology of Early Twenty First Century Irish Poetry, and in the online anthology 21 Poems, 21 Reasons for Choosing Jeremy Corbyn.

The poem Resurrection was previously published in And Agamemnon Dead as well as in 21 Poems, 21 Reasons for Choosing Jeremy Corbyn.

The poem Bosnia at War’s End was previously published in A New Ulster, issue 32.

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Resurrection (Jack Grady) I have a dream that one day armies will shoot with songs instead of bullets generals will shed uniforms for the saffron hues of Hari Khrishnas Buddha will hold conference calls between New York and Geneva St Francis will cradle again the birds of Assisi even insects will have no reason to fear us Lao Tsu will return to expound on mountains that freedom never crowns conquest never plants flags beyond borders

The dead will rise to expose those who killed innocence and blamed the innocent those whose lies hatched our hatred and turned us into murderers those who will hear their grim laughter silenced by their cries of spontaneous confession

Machiavelli will erase The Prince as a fraud Wolfowitz will tell us all Neocons are trapped in the chaos of the clueless the Kennedys will unmask their assassins and spend a week granting absolution to plotters who never imagined it possible

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Isaiah will weep with joy as Ariel abandons Dimona and its shell is claimed by sands of the Negev Wahhabis, spellbound, will intone the poems of Rumi; Shia and Sunni will greet each other with kisses of kindness while sabres of rage remain sheathed and the sacred book’s lions lie down and purr to the licks of lambs in a Kabbalistic Bride’s Reception of jungles, forests and fields redeemed

Nuclear arsenals will explode with a pop harmless and hilarious as clouds of balloons bursting we will at last hear the trees speak tell us why they are rooted and how their quiet peace resurrects flowers and leaves

Ghandi will walk with Jesus on water they will hail the resurrected dreamer— Martin Luther King— while he hauls into his boat constellations of fish with silken nets of starlight

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Bosnia at War’s End (Jack Grady) lamp that still flickers pistol uncocked in a clay pot where a flower blooms

pale neck viewed through a pane of glass with a slanting crack

soldier with one boot on the doorstep

moan light as a whisper

shudder like the flutter of moth's wings

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arched back chill of joy surrender and release

a crow suspended on the bed of the wind

at last a good night's sleep

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Two Refugees (Jack Grady) In her eyes, he sees an anger harder than onyx.

In her breath, he hears a silence more thundering than drums.

In her stance, he reads the muzzled rage of ten thousand women raped in war.

Though he loves her, he dares not touch her, for fear he would find in his hands the disinterred bones of Srebrenica or she would turn to him the cold carcass of her cheek to suffer the mute contrition of his lips.

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Biographical Note: Kevin Higgins Kevin Higgins is co-organiser of Over The Edge literary events in Galway. He has published four collections of poems: The Boy With No Face (2005), Time Gentlemen, Please (2008), Frightening New Furniture (2010), & The Ghost In The Lobby (2014). His poems also feature in Identity Parade – New British and Irish Poets (Bloodaxe, 2010) and in The Hundred Years’ War: modern war poems (Ed Neil Astley, Bloodaxe May 2014). His poetry was last year the subject of a paper titled ‘The Case of Kevin Higgins: Or The Present State of Irish Poetic Satire’ given by David Wheatley at a symposium on satire at the University of Aberdeen. Mentioning The War, a collection of his essays and reviews, was published by Salmon in April, 2012. Kevin’s blog is http://mentioningthewar.blogspot.ie/ . and has been described by Dave Lordan as “one of the funniest around” who has also called Kevin “Ireland’s sharpest satirist.” In October Kevin will be teaching a master class on ‘Satire and the Political World as part of the Irish Writers Centre’s Poetry Masterclass Series http://irishwriterscentre.ie/products/the-poetry-masterclass-series Kevin is satirist-inresidence with the alternative literature website The Bogman’s Cannon. His next book 2016 – The Selected Satires of Kevin Higgins will be published by NuaScéalta very early next year. Song of Songs 2:0 – New & Selected Poems will be published by Salmon in Spring 2017.

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After Paris, Friday 13th (Kevin Higgins) for Regina Doherty & Donald Clarke Professional sidekicks immediately begin showing elected officials of diminutive significance where France is on the map and how to spell “humanity”.

Spectator columnists begin Ejaculating fiercely in their pants. People with no known opinions begin expressing them freely as a drunk piddling on a pavement their ancestors also once ecstatically piddled all over, during the Franco-Prussian War, or the War of Jenkins’ Ear. The Prime Minister of tiny Ireland tearfully remembers the time Padraig Pearse brought Maximilien Robespierre to Ros Muc, as he signs the book of condolence. Everyone agrees now is not the time to question the melangé of antibiotics, cortisone, shark liver oil the patient’s been on this past fourteen years though her face is turning blue. There is a time and a place, and we’ll hopefully never get there.

After the great successes at Baghdad, Falluja, Kabul, Helmand; the obvious answer is bomb Tunisia, West Beirut, Bradford.

Meanwhile, somewhere in the south of the country the Minister for Public Defecation writhes about in a bath of hot mustard to celebrate

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this even better day than the time he injured himself bravely issuing a press release against the gypsies who so obligingly battered a constituent’s granny into the Kingdom no one ever gets to.

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Biographical Note: David Atkinson

David Atkinson is a poet and this is his first submission to A New Ulster

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ABERCORN (David Atkinson)

Between quadratic equations and trigonometry we found time to snigger at each squeak of her leg as she limped back to the board, and we thought nothing about her regrets.

Lingering for a second cup that afternoon, because the craic was good.

Or how she sat down first, on a seat near the window, while her friend sat by the door, and didn't walk away.

With each squeak, with each snigger, regrets.

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FALLUJAH BIRTHDAYS (David Atkinson)

When you were given to us I gave you my name, I rubbed the inside of your mouth with a soft date, I sacrificed two sheep for you, and we feasted.

For you first birthday I gave you a stuffed camel, for your second birthday I gave you building blocks, for your third birthday I gave you a drum, for your fourth birthday I gave you a jigsaw puzzle, for your fifth birthday I gave you your favourite book, for your sixth birthday I gave you prayer beads, for your seventh birthday I gave you a puppet, 50

for your eighth birthday I gave you a football.

For your ninth birthday I gave you new clothes, I gave you an empty box, I washed you clean and kissed you, and we wept.

For your tenth birthday I gave you flowers, for your eleventh birthday I gave you flowers, for your twelfth birthday I gave you flowers.

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NATURE POEM (David Atkinson) for Shimah

A nature poem should be about snow hushed woods late at night, a rainbow's refracted light, counting rings on fallen trees, glades full of honey bees, autumn's harvest, summer flowers, the sun, the earth, the moon, the stars, a nature poem should be about clouds and daffodils.

It should never be about beaches without children, oceans without boats, dawn without birdsong, sunrise without hope, bedtime stories by moonlight, digging holes in the sand, lives measured in days, never holding her hand.

Shimah, nature.

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MUSEUM OF THE WELSH SOLDIER (David Atkinson)

He gave Jack a musket to hold, to feel its weight, and demonstrated how to load it, charge, ball, and wadding, and the damage a musket ball could do to a steel breast plate.

He let him try on an officer’s helmet, complete with flowing plume, hair cut by soldiers from horse’s tails, to keep them clean, and, to prove a point, showed him an oil painting: horses charging into battle with neatly trimmed tails.

He told us, with a sense of irony, how the first VC presented to a Welsh regiment was given to an Irish man.

He told me that Ireland 53

is a beautiful country.

He had been twice, Tyrone and South Armagh, and he hoped to go back, for a holiday this time, now that things were better.

I said that he should, and hoped if he did boys as young as my son wouldn’t throw stones at him, and that women my wife’s age wouldn’t spit in his face and call him “a murdering Brit bastard”, and that a man the same age as me wouldn’t shoot his best friend in the back and leave him to die in his arms.

We’re off to Lanzarote this year.

But maybe next year, if I can convince the missus.

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Biographical Note: Amy Barry

Amy Barry writes poems and short stories. She has worked in the media industry as a Public Relations officer. Her poems have been published in anthologies, journals, and e-zines, in Ireland and abroad. Trips to India, Nepal, China, Bali, Paris, Berlin, have all inspired her work. She lives in Athlone, Ireland.

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Still flickering in the darkness (Amy Barry) Acts of complete madness, devouring their minds, ready to die, not clinging to life.

Arguing the rights and wrongs, facing death with careless composure.

Spilling blood. Seeping blood.

Smearing blood, almost dead.

In clouds of smoke, killings unleashed without mercy.

Words seething in rage, flickering candles guide the mourning city.

Unreal as a dream, the messy process of dying, of life cut shorttoo soon.

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Biographical Note: Marion Clarke

Marion Clarke is a writer and artist from Warrenpoint, on the east coast of Northern Ireland. Earlier this year she won the Financial Times ‘Poet in the City’ haiku competition and was placed third in the Irish Haiku Society’s contest and Croatia’s Ivanić Grad Pumpkin Festival competition in 2014. In 2012 she received a Sakura award in the Vancouver Cherry Blossom Festival contest. Her work is featured in the first national collection of haiku from Ireland - Bamboo Dreams as well as in international journals including Frogpond, The Heron's Nest, Modern Haiku and Haibun Today, as well as in London's Financial Times and Tokyo's The Mainichi. Some of Marion’s poetry and artwork can be found at http://seaviewwarrenpoint.wordpress.com/

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Haiku (Marion Clarke)

Ulster hedgerow the steady click of golf balls

for Seamus Heaney

Chinese Translation (Traditional)

阿阿阿阿阿阿 穩穩穩穩穩 高阿高高

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Biographical Note: Helen Harrison Helen Harrison was raised on the Wirral, seven miles from Liverpool, by Irish parents, and has lived most of her adult life in the border countryside of Co Monaghan, where she is married with a grown-up daughter.

Her poems have been published in A New Ulster, North West Words and The Bray Journal.

Her first collection of poetry ‘The Last Fire’ was published during 2015 by Lapwing.

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AFTER THE DROUGHT (Helen Harrison) The climate that dampens a human heart Is the one where the heron thrives, feeding Nourishment they need; frogs, insects and seeds.

Though seasons that flow can suffer drought As humans suffer pain and doubt, until all That’s left to soothe a heart; is art.

To tap-in to ones creative zone; find a Calm in every climate; like a herons Individual-path of flight. Put your human Mind to use; make no excuse for unnecessary Hardship; find your gift then feed your art To find some peace within your heart..

Tap-in to ones creative zone; find some Peace through flight-paths of release.

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Biographical Note: Amos Greig Amos Greig is the publisher of A New Ulster, he is an artist and a poet whose work has been used in various anthologies including And Agammenon Dead, De Profundis and Poetry in Motion anthologies and poetry projects.

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White Rose (Amos Greig) We are the White Rose in winter bleak, solitary, defiantly rising above the dust and grime, challenging the seasons our midnight scent draws out admirers as we stand alone.

Our roots run deeply becoming one, with the soil, here is the constant truth unambiguous we are the same, a flower in the dark our thorns protect.

We are the White Rose our colours, bleached by harsh weather here a hint of spectrum reveals our past self.

No country, creed, flag or superstition.

Our roots intertwine, mingling below the surface, shoring against the storm, hail, snow and sun our thorns protect and yet we are constantly on guard wary of the gardeners touch.

We are the Winter Rose solitary in our confinement, heads held high to catch the breeze, carry our sirens call, moths come calling in the twilight hours pulsing to the even song.

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Spasms (Amos Greig) Social cohesion was our dream, we the gardeners and cultivators of tomorrow, watched in sadness as rot set in, turned our hopes into bitter memories.

Future's potential sparkles like embers on the breeze as, tomorrows burn like yesterday's discarded leaves.

Like carrion calls, Twitter, comes to life informing of the ongoing strife, hyenas circle the fire.

Deirdre of the sorrows sheds her tears, turns from the fire, pulls her shawl tight around her shoulders. youths take to the street with blood on their mind.

Time has shown that nations come and go, only nature remains triumphant, armed with shield and spear she hunts humanities creations.

We are embers on the wind, fireflies dancing, fleetingly, time consumes our brightness, masked by modern lies.

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Biography: Barbara Gabriella Renzi

LULE I have been painting and drawing since my childhood and my art has always been the intersections of dreams and sweet memories and very often a metaphor of life and of my interiority.

The waves of the sea are also the waves of memory. Every time I bathe in the sea of memory I change the waves and my memories and my memories change me.

My paintings are visual evocations of my childhood: swimming in the warm sea water and floating on and playing with the waves, the internal peace that we lose when we grow, the food and the life in the moment that we forget to live, being the happiest child on earth when tasting and eating a lemon lollypop, the smell of coffee in the house, the taste of sugar with a drop of coffee and that of cinnamon cakes‌ The various images and patterns of my paintings emerge from my night dreams, slowly taking shape as a description of my interior world. They are metaphors of my life and of the different layers of my soul. I mainly use acrylics and oils.

Lule - Barbara Gabriella Renzi Lule started painting under the direction of Italian painter and sculptor Bruno Caviola. She has developed her original style thorough an on-going exploration of the qualities and combinations of textures, colours and materials. Her art has its origin in dreams and memories and it is a metaphor of her life and interiority.

Lule has extensively exhibited in Northern Ireland, Italy and Germany. Her recent exhibitions include solo shows at Synch Space (Bangor), Common Grounds (Belfast) and at the Crescent Arts Centre.

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Pace by Barbara Gabriella Renzi photography by Giulio Napolitano

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