Gold Dust magazine - Issue 19 by Gold Dust magazine

Biannual Magazine of Literature & the Arts Issue 19 - June 2011

It’s goodbye to Claire (and hello to Jolen)!

Welcome to Issue 19 of our small but steadily growing magazine. This is to be the last edition presided over by our long-standing poetry editor Claire Tyne and we are all extremely sorry to see her go. She has ensured Gold Dust’s pages have been filled with the very cutting edge of poetry for the past few years and has helped organise many literary events under the Gold Dust banner, including a writing workshop at her former school, poetry and short story readings, and, perhaps her most consuming contribution, the planning and publication of Liquid Gold, a collection of Gold Dust poetry, which included the organisation of the launch in North London and can now be viewed on Gold Dust’s YouTube channel (http://www.youtube.com/user/golddustmagazine). So it’s a heartfelt goodbye and good luck to Claire! She hands over the reins to the very capable Jolen Whitworth. In this issue, we are once again handing out our annual Gold Dust awards to the very best writing websites (p4). We aim to select the most useful, the clearest, and the most stylish sites in each category, to save you hours of trawling through the web. With this copy of Gold Dust in hand, you can jump straight to the sites you need and pick up a little motivation along the way. Meanwhile, our young features writer, Vicky Thompson, is considering all things vampire in her article on p30. This phenomenon is dominating teenage fiction at the moment, so she decided to get to the bottom of it. In the same spirit, she is also interviewing one of the foremost vampire writers, Rebecca Maizel (p34), and reviewing Rebecca’s first novel (p32). And, of course, we’ve plenty of short stories and poetry for you to curl up with, including our best short story pick and best poem, each of which wins a £20 prize. See you next issue! Omma Velada (GD magazine founder) Join us

Gold Dust magazine www.golddustmagazine.co.uk mailtallulah@googlemail.com Prose Editor & Cover Designer David Gardiner Poetry Editor Claire Tyne Features Vicky Thompson Webmaster, DTP & Founder Omma Velada Proofing Jo Fraser

Mailing list: www.golddustmagazine.co.uk/MailingList.htm Facebook: http://tinyurl.com/golddust MySpace: www.myspace.com/golddustmagazine

Artwork Cover illustration & design Owen Pomery

Circulation Online (www.issuu.com/golddust): ca. 3,000 PDF (www.lulu.com/golddustmagazine): ca. 500

Contents Short stories

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Daughter’s Song by Daniel Knibb BEST PROSE £20 PRIZEWINNER Drama I’m Bruce Lee by Wayne Dean Richards Comedy drama Mowing by Henry Little Drama

My Life by Hayley Sherman Comedy drama

The Reflection by Marie Fleurant Drama

Visiting Time by Corinna Weyreter Supernatural drama

On Finding Your Lover... by Stephen McQuiggan Drama

Back from the Moon by Hilda Sheehan Drama

The Game by Andrew McIntyre Drama

Features

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Best Fiction Sites The best writing sites on the web by Omma Velada Of Readers and Vampires Investigating the vampire phenomenon by Vicky Thompson Interview: Rebecca Maizel Quizzing the author of Infinite Days by Vicky Thompson

Hookers on Archer Avenue by Michael Lee Johnson (p54)

Poems

An Ode to Antonio BEST POETRY £20 PRIZEWINNER Jennifer Sizeland

Think Twice Jeanie Galeazzi

If he could talk Robert Heath

Stew People Tanner

Hookers on Archer Avenue Michael Lee Johnson

The Night Spoke On Dave Migman

Girl from Albany Road Dave Lewis

Golden Harvest SP Oldham

Of Readers and Vampires by Vicky Thompson (p30)

Regulars

Editorial by GD founder Omma Velada

Contributors Our writers’ bios in all their glory

The Back Page Gold Dust news

Reviews

Village of Stones by Brian Lee Reviewed by Omma Velada

Infinite Days by Rebecca Maizel Reviewed by Vicky Thompson

Reflections by Luigi Pagano Reviewed by Claire Tyne

Tony Benn presents Gerrard Winstanley Edited by Andrew Hopton Reviewed by David Gardiner

Best Writers’ Sites Gold Dust Awards 2011

All lists fully updated for 2011

Fiction writing covers a huge range of writing genres and styles, but there are some things all writers have in common and a bit of motivation or tips on how to improve our work is often exactly what we need to give us a push to finish that novel, or start it! Here are our picks for the best writers’ sites of 2011 in each of the following categories:

Motivation When you’re stuck for ideas, or hit writers’ block, this is where to go Genre Sometimes only a fellow genre writer will understand Format If you’ve always wanted to tackle a screenplay, or learn how to write a sonnet Competitions Good for inspiration, recognition and maybe even a little cold hard cash Communities Chat with other writers; find out if your work really is one of staggering genius Publishing If you’re ready to take the leap, here’s where to find agents, PODs and more Promotion Published or not, get your work on view Resources The definitive writers’ toolbox, from dictionaries to character names 4

Best Writers’ Sites Gold Dust Awards 2011

Motivation ● Post A Secret (http://postsecret.blogspot.com) Every secret is a story waiting for your pen... Joining fee: FREE ● Ideas4Writers (www.ideas4writers.co.uk) Over 5,000 ideas to get you writing Joining fee: from £7.95 ● Creative Writing Prompts (www.creativewritingprompts.com) Over 300 writing prompts Joining fee: FREE ● National Novel Writing Month (www.nanowrimo.org) November is the magic month Joining fee: FREE (optional donation) ● Book in a Week (www.book-in-a-week.com) For those too ambitious for NaNoWriMo Joining fee: from $3.00 ● 3-Day Novel (www.3daynovel.com) The pressure’s on, but first prize is publication Joining fee: $50 ● Fifteen Minutes of Fiction (www.fifteenminutesoffiction.com) For your briefer creative bursts Joining fee: FREE ● WriteInvite (www.write-invite.com/index.php) Competitions and live events Joining fee: FREE And for a change of scene when writers’ block strikes... ● Literary Rejections On Display (http://tiny.cc/5g983) Hilarious round-up of rejection letters ● Absolute Write (http://absolutewrite.com) Insightful blog on all things writing ● Writers FM (www.writersfm.com/writersfm) The only radio station by writers, for writers

Genre ● Romance All Romance Writers (http://allromancewriters.com) ● Science Fiction Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers of America (www.sfwa.org) ● Fantasy Elfwood (www.elfwood.com) ● Horror Horror Writers Association (http://horror.org) ● Western Western Writers of America (www.westernwriters.org) ● Crime The Crime Writers Association (www.thecwa.co.uk) ● Thriller International Thriller Writers (www.thrillerwriters.org) ● Historical Historical Fiction Network (www.histfiction.net)

Format ● Novels Novelists Inc (www.ninc.com) ● Short stories Short stories (www.short-stories.co.uk) ● Poetry Moontown Cafe (www.moontowncafe.com) ● Screenwriting The Lonely Keyboard (http://lonelykeyboard.com) ● Memoirs Write My Memoirs (www.writemymemoirs.com) ● Children Write4Kids (www.write4kids.com) ● Young Adult Writing for Children & Teens (www.writingforchildrenandteens.com) Issue 19

June 2011 www.golddustmagazine.co.uk

Best Websites Gold Dust Awards 2011

Competitions ● Firstwriter (www.firstwriter.com/competitions) Free database of current writing competitions ● Story (www.theshortstory.org.uk/prizes) Comprehensive listings of major short story contests ● PoetryKit (www.poetrykit.org/comps.htm) Poetry contests listed by closing date

Promotion US-based ● Published (www.published.com) Create an online genre-specific profile for your book Fee: FREE ● Writerlance (www.writerlance.com) Like eBay for writers, bid on the writing projects you fancy Fee: No signup fees. Commission is 3% of your bid (min $3.00) ● Constant Content (www.constant-content.com) Post your writing efforts for sale Fee: Author receives 65% of article sale price ● The Short Review (www.theshortreview.com) Just for short story anthologies Fee: FREE UK-based ● LoveWriting (http://www.lovewriting.co.uk/) Advice and promotion for writers Fee: £100 + VAT promotion package

Publishing Around 7,000 new small publishers form each year; these listings sites try to keep pace

Print-on-Demand (POD) ● Lulu (www.lulu.com) The rapidly growing instant-publishing site, already published 1m authors Publishing fee: FREE (premium options available) ● Books and Tales (http://booksandtales.com/pod/index.php) POD listings with pricing guide Small Press Publishers ● Preditors & Editors (http://pred-ed.com) Lists mainly US publishers with advice and info Small Press Magazines ● Duotrope (http://duotrope.com) Free database of over 3,000 fiction & poetry publications ● Galactic Central (www.philsp.com) 7,000+ magazines listed, including folded publications ● Dust Books (www.dustbooks.com) Publishes printed directories of small press operations ● CLMP (www.clmp.org/index.html) Council of Literary Magazines and Presses, since 1967

Best Websites Gold Dust Awards 2011

Writing communities UK-based ● Great Writing (www.greatwriting.co.uk) A clear and stylish site, with solid content Joining fee: FREE ● ABC Tales (www.abctales.com) Over 70,000 stories online - add yours! Joining fee: FREE ● UK Authors (www.ukauthors.com) Friendly community of writers with excellent resources Joining fee: £10 p/yr (optional donation) ● WriteWords (www.writewords.org.uk) Extensive, clearly laid-out listings Joining fee: from £20 p/yr US-based ● Poets & Writers (www.pw.org) America’s largest non-profit organization for creative writers Joining fee: FREE ● Writing.com (www.writing.com) Over 800,000 members, free memberships available Joining fee: FREE (premium memberships available) ● FanStory (www.fanstory.com) Since 2000, with a star-ratings feedback system Joining fee: FREE (premium memberships available) ● BBS Writers (www.writers-bbs.com) The most active writers’ forums on the Web Joining Fee: FREE (premium memberships available) ● Fiction Press (www.fictionpress.com) Over 1million members, this one’s vast, don’t get lost! Joining fee: FREE

Resources ● Dictionary (http://dictionary.reference.com) Dictionary, thesaurus, encyclopaedia and more ● Bartleby (www.bartleby.com) Free access to encyclopaedias and other reference books ● The Fiction Factor (www.fictionfactor.com) Writing tips direct to your inbox in a monthly email ● Acronym Finder (www.acronymfinder.com) Find what any acronym stands for ● Your Dictionary (www.yourdictionary.com/library/misspelled.html) Most misspelled words ● Ref Desk (www.refdesk.com) Impressive collection of tools and links for research ● Baby Names (www.babynames.com) Find your next character’s name here ● Project Gutenberg (www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Main_Page) Over 30,000 free ebooks ● Internet Public Libarary (www.ipl.org) Resources, newspapers & magazines ● Publishing Law (http://publaw.com) Articles and links on the legal side of getting into print ● English Grammar Online (www.ego4u.com) Need to swot up? Start right here ● Jacqui Bennett Writers Bureau (www.jbwb.co.uk) Extensive listings of useful writing sites

Gold Dust Issue 19

June 2011

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BEST PROSE £20 PRIZEWINNER

Daughter’s Song

by Daniel Knibb Burying a father brings some strange feelings...

or such an unobtrusive man, my father is raising quite a stink in death. It’s the fifth day now, I can smell him from every room in the house. I shouldn’t have delayed so long. A dignified solution for up to one week they had told me, the funeral director and his unpleasantly chirpy assistant, but their ‘light embalming’ is no match for this August heat. The taste of formaldehyde is in my mouth; I go to the kitchen in search of orange squash, but come across a bottle of Plymouth gin instead, which will do just as well. The ice clinks as I lift my glass and the cool fizz of tonic water tickles my lips. Burying a father brings some strange feelings. Especially when he isn’t actually your father. (He met my mother when I was three; my real father was long gone by then.) Still, I find bereavement becomes me rather well. One of the bleak advantages of losing two parents in six months is how rapidly a girl becomes adept at the business 8

of mourning. Dad’s passing happened slowly, gradually withdrawing into dismal depressive mists till I could barely see the man I’d loved for nearly thirty years. Mother’s death, by contrast, came like a burglar: I went to bed one night and woke the next morning to find my life had been unexpectedly ransacked. Yet, I must admit, the signs had been there. Last year she put on weight at a startling speed. She had never been slim, at least not since I had come along (it had been that man, my biological father, who had ruined her life, she often complained, but me who had ruined her figure). Amongst the many things I had learned from her were distaste for one’s own body and a furtive obsession with food. Her size tormented her, and though she tried her best to pretend otherwise, I knew she was often deeply unhappy. Yet now I know the truth about her – or what I assume is the truth – everything I thought I knew could be utterly wrong. In the last few months

of her life, she may very well have been over the moon. This morning I had an appointment with the family doctor. He must be close to retirement now, though he seemed unchanged from my earliest memories of him. The hours I had spent in his surgery! Childhood images swam before me. The dusty Venetian blinds, the cartoon height chart on the door, the framed photos of his wife (dead: cancer, five years ago, according to Mother) and young son (grown up now: an optician in Devizes). His gentle, muffled voice, like a drum filled with socks. The jar of lollipops he dispensed so liberally, making up for his complete failure to cure either my psoriasis or the stammer that haunted my schooldays. To be there again after so long was comforting and disturbing all at once. ‘So, you’re still in London?’ he asked as he scribbled in someone’s notes. ‘Tottenham,’ I said. ‘Teaching at an FE college.’

Daughter’s Song by Daniel Knibb ‘Oh yes?’ he replied, looking up briefly. ‘What subject?’ ‘Music. I give piano lessons at home in the evenings too. Some of us from the music department have formed a little piano quintet.’ He smiled. ‘You were always so talented. Your parents were terribly proud of you.’ ‘I know,’ I started to say, but the words choked up so I nodded instead. The doctor was still writing, not looking at me. It was very quiet. I could hear the scratching of his pen and, somewhere far away, a child crying. Finally he made a dramatic full stop and turned to face me. His thick beard and unfashionable glasses, once

so reassuring, now had a disquieting Shipman air. ‘Look here, Katherine,’ he said, throwing the glasses onto his desk and rubbing his face, ‘I’m in a bit of a fix here. You’ve had so much to deal with recently. Your father… I blame myself. I should have seen it coming.’ Suddenly he looked old. His eyes, weighed down with years, bore lines too many to count. ‘I don’t want to add to your troubles,’ he said, ‘but there’s something you should know. Back in January when your mother passed away, your father asked me – in the strongest terms – not to reveal

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June 2011

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all the facts of her death to you. He felt, and I agreed, it would have done you no good to know everything until you were ready. We were fortunate, I suppose, that you were too upset by it all to ask very much. You never wanted to see the death certificate, did you?’ I shifted in my chair and fiddled with the loose skin around my fingernails. He continued uneasily into silence. ‘You remember, of course, that your mother died from a stroke, after a sudden rise in blood pressure?’ I nodded again, impatient now. ‘Well, that’s absolutely true. Your mother’s cardiovascular health was less than tip-top for many years. But the cause – ah – the cause, well – ’ He was struggling, and for a nasty second I was pleased. Damn him and my Dad, cooking up a plot to keep me in the dark. ‘Go on,’ I said as evenly as I could. ‘Yes,’ he mumbled into his beard, ‘it was something we call eclampsia.’ The name rang faint bells, but its meaning was fuzzy. There was something unpleasantly physical about it, the word clamp in there like a threat of violence. ‘What?’ I said, more brutally than I’d intended. He looked even more discomfited. ‘Eclampsia. A spike in blood pressure, during the latter stages of pregnancy.’ 9

Daughter’s Song by Daniel Knibb I actually laughed. ‘Pregnancy? She would have turned fifty this year, you know.’ It was so ridiculous, I couldn’t stop giggling. His grave expression just made it worse. ‘Katherine – ’ ‘You’re joking! I mean, she wanted a whole brood of babies – she must have told you, she told everyone – but there was some reason they couldn’t have any; something that happened when she had me, I think, or something wrong with Dad. Well, you must know, for God’s sake, you were their doctor.’

He wasn’t replying. My laughter subsided. ‘Doctor Phelps, I think there must be some mistake.’ He reached out and took my hand. ‘Katherine,’ he said, unbearably sadly, ‘your mother was nine months pregnant when she died.’ I like to think I elected not to have children. The men who have blown through my life have come and gone without their seed ever taking root, and that is – most of the time – just as I would have chosen. To go through childhood again as a parent would be even more painful than as the tubby, stam-

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mering kid I once was. Mother never understood: eighteen years alone with her desiccated parents left her thirsty for a life of colour and noise and messy, muddy, paint-smeared glee. Though we never doubted each other’s love, she and I were poles apart. When Doctor Phelps had finished with me and said his nervous farewells, I wandered out into the car park. The day was hazy with summer heat, and I felt slightly sick. I drove back slowly, noticing nothing. The gravel on the drive crunched like bones as I pulled up. My parents’ house. No, my house now. Strange to see it in summer sunshine; since I left for college at eighteen I had known it only in its Christmas regalia. Now I came to take a proper look at the place, it seemed utterly changed, shrunken, an orphan. Finding it waiting silently for me, musty from neglect and reeking of my decomposing father, gave me shivers. The family piano, an old mahogany upright, sat in the corner of the lounge like a forgotten dog who no longer bothered to whine. As I lifted its lid, months of dust span up into the light. I tried it first with a Debussy prelude, but the damper springs were going and the arpeggios were muted, muddy. I gave it a couple of Mozart sonatas, which it preferred,

Daughter’s Song by Daniel Knibb then a Schubert lied. My voice is a rarely-used, poorly-tuned instrument, but it was a surge of pleasure that came upon me as I let loose those gorgeous German vowels. The tall cobwalled room sang the notes high up into its rafters and lingered in letting them die; sad echoes filled the air around me. I fixed myself a drink and came back for a little jazz. Not my usual forte, I admit, but the piano loved it. I even rested my glass on the case for a bit of that bar-room sound. Crooning along to the blue, bruised chords, I was surprised and ashamed to find myself as happy as I could ever remember being. Music can do that to me. It was the instant hit, the narcotic daze of it. I just slipped away, gratefully disappearing between the notes. Nothing else quite touched the spot. All my achievements (and there have been some, even I must admit: the degrees, the promotions, the faculty battles won, the students won round; even, occasionally, a half-decent man) – their lustre fades with time. Only music lifts me, rewards me, forgives me every time. Like my bitten nails, no matter how much abuse I give it, music keeps growing within me, forever growing despite the pain.

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Several hours and drinks later, I have played myself out and there’s nothing left to do but go to bed. I pick up the gin bottle and pop into the back room to say goodnight. It is a macabre ritual, but over the last few nights it has become reassuring. The room is dark but for a little moonlight. I sit in the chair beside the coffin. After all that booze the smell doesn’t seem so bad. So, Dad, I say. How’re you doing? You know, I’ve been meaning to ask you something. About what Doctor Phelps told me. A few weeks ago, you went to see him, didn’t you? He gave you pills – to help you sleep, you said. He’d not thought you’d still have all those old sedatives of Mother’s stashed away too. Certainly helped you sleep, anyway, eh? Sorry, that wasn’t very nice. I’m a bit drunk. I know, I shouldn’t drink so much. But, you know, it’s your funeral tomorrow. Give me some slack. Anyway, I – oh God, why am I even asking? I must be going mad. I just need to know: did you know Mother was pregnant? Did she tell you? Did you guess? Pregnant women get sick, they get tired... mind you, Mother did all that anyway. But you must have realised. Why didn’t you tell me? I know I haven’t visited as

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often as I should. I would have, but I just couldn’t cope with seeing you both so miserable, inching through life like two tortoises heading for a cliff. I’d think: next weekend, next month... But then I’d imagine her there in the kitchen, sniping at you out of one side of her mouth – Gerald have you done this? Gerald why isn’t this finished? Gerald when exactly are you planning to do something useful for a change? – and out of the other side telling me I should settle down, get married, have a baby. Can you blame me for not coming more often? Dad’s not replying. Outside the moon ducks behind a cloud, and we fall into darkness. Did you know she was pregnant? Did she, even? She was definitely more cheerful all through last year. Last Christmas was really nice; something had changed for sure. She must have known. But did you? And more than that, the big question: oh God, I can’t even ask it, even now you’re... Was it yours? You never talked about it, but I knew the two of you couldn’t have kids. That’s what Mother always said, or hinted at. She’d go dark and moody whenever the subject came up. Could you not come up with the goods? Were yours all 11

Daughter’s Song by Daniel Knibb swimming in the wrong direction? Or did you not want any more children? Was I enough for you? There weren’t many other men about, that’s for sure. Not since she had to quit work the year before last, when she was really bad. The doctor had to come to the house, didn’t he? Because she wouldn’t go outside. But he’d talked to her, given her pills, given his time. She’d liked that, you said. After a year with the tablets and the regular house calls, she was improving. Even though she started to put on all that extra weight, she was brighter, happier. Blooming. And you said to me it was a good thing, wasn’t it, that the doctor had been so kind to her, even come out on his own time to see her, bring her out of herself, coax her into taking little trips out with him. They got quite close, you said. Oh Christ. Oh, Dad. Oh, the bastard.

clip-clop across the hot tarmac, cursing my high heels and stuffy black jacket and tight skirt and smart clothes in general. The room is as cool and numbing as an anaesthetic. Pale wooden panelling and the discreet hum of air conditioning. Sinking into a chair in the front row, I take off my jacket and put it on the seat next to me, protecting my space. I can feel my face growing tight and unwelcoming. Behind me the door opens and closes, but noone comes to talk to me. The ceremony is short and mercifully plain. Obviously I had made myself clear to the funeral director: my father was quiet, agnostic and unsentimental, and that was exactly

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The doorbell is ringing. Sunlight is slicing through the curtain. I shake my head and remember: it is the morning of the funeral. The men are here to pick him up. They wait for me as I hurry to wash and dress, my brain in a bleary daze. I follow the hearse to the crematorium, park badly and

how his funeral would be. At the end I stand up and walk slowly to the piano. My father had a penchant for Schumann – perhaps he was a little sentimental after all – so I play the second Romanze, opus twenty-eight, as gentle and strong and tragic as Dad himself turned out to be. Most people would have chosen Träumerei, I suppose, something the others might recognise, but bugger them. This is me and my Dad. The mourners, few that they are, start to shuffle and pick up their bags. I recognise most of them. His boss; some old colleagues; Tom and Victor from the club. There’s a few of the local fishwives, of course, looking at me half-pityingly,

Daughter’s Song by Daniel Knibb half-accusingly, as if my flaws had somehow been delivered on my parents and brought all this about. The Romanze is a short piece even when taken slowly, but by the time I slip the music into my bag and walk down the aisle there is only one person left seated. It is Doctor Phelps, weeping. He hears my heels and glances up, startled, like a boy caught doing something shameful. I stop, hold his gaze for a long moment. He looks away, and I walk on. The day outside is painfully bright, but I think the weather is turning. There is a breeze coming across the lawns and rustling the poplars, which shake their heads at me as I unbutton the top of my

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blouse. The cool air tickles my skin. I think of summer holidays in France, emerging from campsite swimming pools, hurrying to hide myself in a towel. My cheeks are wet and I realise that, for the first time since Mother died, I am crying. It feels good. I sink to the kerb and bury my face in my hands. ‘’Scuse me? Sorry, ’scuse me?’ There is a girl looking at me, surely not more than eighteen, pushing a buggy from which a strangulated wailing strikes up as she stops in front of me. She’s a big girl, bulging out of her low-cut jeans, with scraped-back ginger hair and pudgy sausage fingers. ‘Sorry, love, you couldn’t – Taylor, shut up! – you couldn’t just watch my little girl for two seconds while I move my car, could you? Some bastards have parked so tight either side of me, I can’t get the door open.’ I look at her, bemused, and dumbly nod. I watch her hurry away towards an old Fiesta which she attempts to climb into via its boot. The noise from the buggy is getting louder and more desperate, changing pitch in a sudden minor third. I get up and peer in at the puce, bawling face. ‘That’s my favourite interval, Taylor. How did you know? Schumann uses it a lot. Did you know I’d just been playing

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his Romanze?’ Taylor stops crying and gives me a look of unfocussed confusion. ‘You must know it,’ I say, ‘it goes like this.’ And I start to sing. Strongly, unafraid, into the warm summer air, like the chorister I never was. The beautiful little girl Mother would have shown off to everyone. The perfect daughter, the little angel. Another hearse goes by, trailed by a line of cars. They are probably looking at me. I hope the hearse driver doesn’t crash, distracted by the singing madwoman in the car park. The thought amuses me and Schumann dissolves into giggles. I laugh and laugh, and Taylor breaks into bubbling gurgles of pleasure along with me. She has pretty eyes, I notice. Her mother puffs back over to us. ‘Thanks ever so much, you’re a darling,’ she says to me as she reaches into the buggy. ‘All right, Taylor? Come on then. Look at you, chuckling away.’ She turns to me and shakes her head, grateful and resentful. ‘You’re a natural with kids, ain’t you? You should teach me your tricks, making this one stop crying. You must be a brilliant mum, eh?’

Gold Dust 13

I’m Bruce Lee Wayne Dean Richards My mom said once that she wished I’d die before her...

found it in the attic. It’d been there for years and it was dusty. The house belonged to my dad so I suppose he put it there. My dad might’ve been a soldier. I don’t really remember real-life things, so I’m not sure. I took it out of the box it was in. It was heavy in my hand. A lot heavier than I thought it’d be. It was wrapped in an oilcloth and there was a smudge of oil on the barrel and some dust had stuck to the smudge. I wiped off the dust-smudge and then carried it down from the attic. I was limping. The stairs creaked. I was sweating. The sweat stung the cuts on my face. He’d broken my things. He’d broken into a house that used to be my dad’s to steal and then he’d smashed things just for the sake of it. He was there to steal my television. He planned to sell it. I understood him stealing to sell, but smashing things up for the sake of it and then pissing on the carpet and laughing at me when he did it...those things I didn’t understand. But I’m getting ahead of myself here. What happened 14

before any of that was that I was asleep. I sleep in my mom and dad’s old room, in my mom and dad’s old bed. I think they’d be proud of the fact that I haven’t changed anything. I’d taken one of my tablets and I was asleep, but he made so much noise I woke up. My heart beat fast. All my life, whenever my heart’s beaten fast I’ve felt sick and this time was no exception. Careful to make no noise, I got out of bed. My mom said once that she wished I’d die before her. She wasn’t being mean when she said it. She didn’t say it because she didn’t love me. She did love me and she wanted to look after me to try and make up for things: I know she felt bad about the time she and my dad let me be taken away. “Don’t worry,” I told her when she was dying. “I’ll be alright,” I told her, and that was what I whispered as I pulled on my dressing gown and crept downstairs, straining my eyes in the dark. I thought I was quiet, but he must have heard me because when I pushed open the door to the living room he

switched on the table lamp and looked straight at me. He was a big man with tattoos on his knuckles and throat. I hoped he’d run away, but he didn’t. I don’t have a phone. Even if I did he wouldn’t have let me reach it. I saw that he’d disconnected my television and put it in the middle of the floor ready to take it. At that point he hadn’t smashed anything. He looked me up and down as if he was measuring me for a new suit. I hoped he’d run, but he didn’t, and now I thought about running. I wondered if I’d be able to get through the door before he got to me. I didn’t think it would be possible and so I thought of: Enter The Dragon and Way Of The Dragon and Fist Of Fury and The Big Boss and Game Of Death all of which I’ve seen at least fifty times, and I set one foot in front of the other, bent my knees slightly and raised my fists. “I’m Bruce Lee,” I said. That was when he hit me. And he kept hitting me long after I was on the floor and my face was bleeding. And that was when, laughing, he pissed on my carpet and started

Henry Little

I’m Bruce Lee by Wayne Dean Richards smashing things. When he was done with all that: when he was on his way out, carrying my television, he paused and looked down at me. I hadn’t moved since he knocked me down. He shook his head the way my dad sometimes used to, to show disappointment or disgust. “Bruce Lee,” he said, and made a clicking noise with his tongue. It didn’t occur to me that he’d come back, but two days later, almost as if he’d known I’d be scared to call the police: that’s just what he did. Only this time it was different. For a start: this time I found him in the kitchen. More importantly: me being Bruce Lee two

days earlier had got me a beating, so I knew as soon as I woke up that this time I should be someone else. I think that’s what’d led me up into the attic. With the gun in my hand I asked myself: Who shall I be? I’ve watched so many movies I was spoiled for choice. I thought at first that I’d be Alan Ladd in Shane, but a fast draw wasn’t really my style. Then I thought about being Gregory Peck’s Jimmy Ringo character in The Gunfighter, but that hadn’t worked out well for him so I didn’t want to go that route. In the end, I suppose, once I’d felt the weight of the gun, the decision was easy. The weight of the gun dragged against my arm as I

carried it, limping, downstairs and into the kitchen. The man who’d broken into the house two nights before seemed like he’d been waiting for me: as if all this was some sort of game for him. At first he didn’t see the gun in my hand. If he had, maybe he wouldn’t have put down my microwave and laughed at me and said: “Who the fuck are you this time?” But in a way it was good that he spoke. It was good that he had this line because it made him part of the scene: a principal player. He said his line and I raised the gun and pointed it at him. “I’m Dirty Harry,” I said.

Gold Dust

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Issue 19

June 2011

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BEST POETRY £20 PRIZEWINNER

An Ode to Antonio ‘You stick to the sermons and I’ll do the building’ Shunning companionship for curvature, Straight edges for ripples and corridors For oval whale skeletons Ceilings that swirled the room With tiles from the ocean floor A house of bones for mermaids Living in a towered snail-shell A woman of fire as his muse. Was he a lunatic or genius? Erroneous, austere or vulgar? Hanging sacks and chains Inverted for his extroversion A recycled echoing of nature’s will A future thrown past modern perception. Shielding intellect with a straight palm The string holding his clothes together Marked a blueprint on his chest As the passengers on the tram Handed the tramp obituary. He was a saint when he was gone A white beard called down from The softly illuminated heavens ‘I could overcome everything in life Except my bad character’. As the feet of Barcelona, Walked his tiles in mourning. Jennifer Sizeland

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Review

The Village of Stones is not your average poetry chapbook. For a start, it’s a weighty little tome, with over 70 pages of poetry, divided into two periods (1985-92 and 1995-2005), with an intriguing unexplained three-year writing gap inbetween. In all, it covers 20 years of writing, so I was expecting an experienced poet who is serious about his work. Then there is the dizzying scope of the work. All the usual themes – love, death, nature – are to be found, but more original ones also, from identity to friendship, to poetry itself. But the most powerful message I took – and in line with Brian’s other creative outlet, his ambient musical partnership with Claudia van Buren as part of Naked Light (www.nakedlight.co.uk) - is that of the elusiveness yet paradoxical transience of peace, tranquility and silence. For example, ‘Music for the dark of the moon’, like Rachel Whiteread’s artwork, explores the gaps between ‘things’, and ‘Turn everything off’, wittily requests that we ‘turn off the talking machine’ and ‘only ever silence’, which suggests we must recognize the silence endemic to the human condition before we can build our lives. This is compounded by the poem that introduces Part II, which relates to listening, and even features one page left entirely blank, perhaps for readers to take a moment of peace for themselves. Issue 19

June 2011

Title here

Village of Stones by Brian Lee £5.99 (Book), £10.00 (CD) 80 pages Reviewed by Omma Velada

But what really sets this chapbook apart is its CD of audio accompaniment – indicated with a speaker icon in the contents list – which really brings these poems to life. Some are read to ambient music played by Brian, others sung by Claudia (what she does with the poem ‘travellin’ is truly astonishing), and some read quietly in Brian’s voice. I listened to the CD while cooking dinner and it was a wonderful and inspiring way to enjoy music, words and ideas all together – and quite different from reading the poems ‘silently’ to yourself. Many of the poems are left untitled, yet they resonate powerfully enough to stand alone. Only three of the poems have been previously published, so the chapbook, though completed over five years ago, still feels fresh. Because it follows a timeline, there is a clear and natural progression to the collection, with the more ambitious pieces occurring later on. It is rewarding to follow the poet on his own journey, as we read these insights from his experience and observations. The romantic in me means that ‘resurrection’ is my favourite of the collection, with its powerful rendition of the endurance of love beyond the grave: love does not know death it returns from the grave and walks and grows flowers and talks to drunks and phones you late just to hear your voice The anthology closes with helpful notes to the poems to explain obscure or foreign words from someone who clearly loves language and expression, as surely every poet must.

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Mowing

Henry Little

What do you think about all the time..?

nother thing to think about is the blade height. This is adjusted by a front and rear dip-lock so you can mow really low, like a close shave, or high, and that’s good for long patches, and lawns with moss. Moss really messes things up, because it doesn’t always look long, but it gets caught and you end up ripping up bits out of the lawn and you have to tread them back in. Like at Lady Berry’s, she doesn’t like it when the moss gets ripped. I always think she should get some weed killer on it but she thinks it looks more natural or something. Funny, she’s not the most natural person exactly, looks about seventy, but I think she’s only about sixty. Married to this old Italian Professor. Berry doesn’t sound like an Italian name to me, but still. He’s not right either, I’d say. They’ve got this great big white house, tall chimneys and this big conservatory, and a massive lawn, two hundred strips all in, I reckon, maybe more, and there’s trees on bits of it, so you have to go around them, 18

and there’s the moss. I came down to the end of a strip a few years ago, hot day, I was just in my shorts, he was there at their living room window, and he had a handkerchief or a tissue by his middle, I think. I didn’t stop because when you’re turning the turns have to be one smooth action or you lose the rhythm and have to do a three pointer and that wastes loads of time. So I only looked up just before I was going into the turn and then I was into it and it was just this look sort of half at me, but not, and then I was off into another strip, concentrating on getting the edges right, and that’s the best part of a hundred yards, then another hundred back again, and he’s moved back from the window by then. I use the higher setting for the orchard, too, at Lady Berry’s. She has apples, pears, quinces – those furry lemons – that sort of thing, and this nice little square garden with vegetables growing in, in sections with paths through the middle. The grass in the orchard gets really long, and there’s nettles and rocks and things, so she

gave me an extra fiver for doing it once but she’s stopped since. The good thing is it’s right next to two of the drop piles, so even though the bag fills up quick it’s only ten feet or so to empty it, even if you’re down the far side. There’s one by the boxing hedges, and then the compost box, which has this nasty bit of old carpet on top of it, right up by the wall. As I said, good mowing is about the emptying. If you get full out in the middle of the lawn it’s a nightmare, walking thirty yards each way, at least, one way with a heavy bag that’s spilling out on the clean stripes you’ve done. That’s why you can’t just go on for ever, because the bag fills up until the grass sits on the blades and bits start falling out as you go along. You can’t just have it coming out the back, it doesn’t look good. Not good for the engine either, he says, overfilling. So you have to time it so you don’t get stuck far from a pile. Some lawns only have the one spot so you have to be pretty careful, sometimes empty the bag when it’s not quite full. The other thing is that if you stop

Mowing by Henry Little when it’s really full you always get some bits falling out, and even if you hoover around before you move off it always leaves this little bit of mess. What do you think about all the time? That’s what most people would ask, I think. It’s funny, because it’s not really in your control, you can’t decide to think about one thing or the other, because it is what you are thinking about, how the line’s running, when to start the turn, is the bag two thirds or three quarters, whether to keep going one more line or empty at the end of this one, how many more lines to go, whether you could get away with a slightly higher setting, whether you will have to do the orchard, whether she’ll tip again, all this kind of stuff. So most of the time, that’s what you’re thinking about, it keeps you occupied. Nice in a way, like driving, or fishing, keeps you from thinking too much. But there’s always a bit of

space left. Most of the time you end up thinking about exactly the same stuff, each time you go round, it’s weird, like it’s on a loop. I have had the same music stuck in my head almost since I’ve started doing it. It’s my friend’s thing, he’s a DJ in London, exciting, really good, met him a few years ago. He’s DJing in his bedroom on this, and he’s got all his friends doing the rapping stuff over the top, oldschool Garage. They’re brilliant, and it’s like I can’t get these guys’ voices out of my head, all the time going round and round while I’m mowing, it’s like they help me mow quicker cos the music’s fast and the words are sort of energising. As I say, you can’t really choose what you want to think about it just sort of comes. I think about her a bit, too, when I’m doing her lawn. I know she’s unhappy. He says she drinks, on her own often, in that little room by the yard. Says he’s heard her screech-

ing and shouting like some demon, nobody even there. Once I was up the top by the gate and this man led her in off the street, said she’d told him she lived here, he didn’t look too sure. I took her back into the house. The Professor never said anything, just took her away, and she didn’t mention it. Probably didn’t remember I guess. But she must be really angry about something. Once the Professor hid all the corkscrews in the house, so she started smashing the necks of the bottles to drink them. I’ve seen him, too, behind the kitchen window, round the back, about lunchtime, stood right there, bottle of red wine tipped up, just drinking away at it. I wonder if she was happy when she was younger. She might have been quite pretty then. Still is, sort of. I wonder if we’ll keep doing the lawns after they’re gone.

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Issue 19

June 2011

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artobigraffy artabograffi autobigrafy my life Hayley Sherman i wont b thinking about her when im licking shampane of zack effrons chest in Londen...

jannuary my name is kylie black. OF corse u will no me by my stage name by the time u read this book, but at the moment im, kylie. 16 years old and waiting to b a star. i dont no how i did it yet, but this is gonna b my year and if your reading this book it meens that i suckseeded. at the moment im waiting 2 go back 2 scool after being exclooded again. old fat arse faulkner tried 2 make me copy of the bord and i told her 2 fuck rite of. cant beleeve she got me slung out for that. silly bitch. no 1 else chucks me out when i tell them 2 fuck of. thay just leav me alone. no 1 else trys 2 make me copy shit of the bord tho. Eny way just means that the cristmas holadays are a bit longer. chelseas mums leting her bunk untill I go back 2 scool so its blue wkds alround. woooo hooooo. she thinks shes gonna b famos 2. fat chance with those thies., ive been pracitising me singing in case thats wot I get famos for (i no u already no why im famos). mum sed i sound like sum1 called sonia. i dont no if 20

thats good or bad. Eny way she sed all i need 2 no in life is how 2 sine me name, but i cant claim benafits until im 18 so lets call that a back up plan.

febbuary i was gonna apply for big brother but thay stoped it. making this getting famos thing a bit more harder. i called up about im a celebraty get me out of her but thay said i had 2 b a celebraty. its a vishos sirckle. u have 2 b a celebraty 2 get on it but u cant becum a celebraty un less u go on it. i told them 2 fuck rite of. fat arse faulkner tryed 2 get me chucked out agen but the scool docter tipe thing wot cums 2 scool told her that i cant help being me and she shood stop picking on me. silly bitch. she told me that if i didnt start doin sommat id fail me exams (like i need exams 2 b on telly). i told her that may b if shed done better at scool she woodnot have 2 b a fucking teecher. eny way i wont b thinking about her when im licking shampane of zack effrons chest in Londen. gave Josh a bj for valun-

times day.

march me and chelsea have been on the sunbed. her brother sed sommat about his mates dad taking picters for magerzines so where gonna b modles. chelsea can barly fit her thies in the sunbed so i dont think thay will fit in a magerzine. im gonna b a internashionall modle and then have a chat show wot tells other people how 2 get famos like me. Chelsea didnot cum in the end becoz it was a tits out kind of shoot but thats fine by me. I had the picters dun then gave him a bj. he sed hell give me sum mony wen thay sell but i havnot herd eny thing yet. i told miss faulkner and she told me mum. me mum told her 2 fuck rite of. still havnot herd eny thing from chelseas brothers mate, but that wot happens sum times. no point in doin eny thing else so me and chelsea have been hangin around in the park agen. found this sider in the coop witch is 3pound summat for a grate big bottle. saw the

my life by Hayley Sherman career tipe bloke wot cums in scool and he sez i shood apply for that factery wot sacked me mum. i told him he shood apply theâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re if he thinks its so good. still no word from chelseas brothers mate. Chelseas brother sed I giv the best bjs in the world.

aprill get this. chelseas applyed 2 do

cooking at city collage. i told her those thies wont thank her for that. she sed i shood think about doin sommat. silly cow. just coz shes bottled it dont mean the rest of us hav 2. and shes started copying stuff of the bord. fat arse faulkner nealy wet herself. silly cow. i hop she dont think that im gonna. still nothing from chelseas broth-

ers mate but i dont wont 2 b a modle now eny way. i saw this thing about modles and thay have 2 do modling outside wen its realy cold even if its rainin or snowin. most modles arnot famos eny way. mum sez there just cloths horses. i dont wont peeple thinkin im a horse so im gonna b a actoress. have been looking on line for zack effrons address and eny 1 else hoo i can talk 2 but no luck so far.

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called the bbc wot make that proggram with the girls in and there hair 2 ask if i cood b in it. the bitch on the fone woodnot put me throo 2 eny 1 so i told her 2 fuck rite of. dont wont 2 b a actoress now eny way.

may on study leeve at the moment so im studying jordans artobigraffy artabograffi autobigrafy life. wot u need 2 do good in this life is big tits big lips and a telly proggram wot follows u about. and a celebraty husband. my tits are big but thay need 2 b more rubbery so im gonna have them made smaler then made bigger and stufed with levver or wotever it is. And have sum put in me lips. and i need 2 loose 8 stones. mum sed i need 2 do it sensabblee so im only gonna eat beetween 6 and 6: 15 in the evenin. havenot lost eny wait yet becoz my watch keeps stoping.

Issue 19

June 2011

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my life by Hayley Sherman still havnot herd eny thing from chelseas brothers mate. like i give a fuck. Havenot herd much from chelsea eether. her mum sed that shes been studying but she woz of her head on cocane so she proberblee got it rong. Shes proberblee stuck in her room with a jam donnut agen. saw fat arse faulkner in town with her boyfrend. hes butters. no wunder her face always looks like a smacked arse if she has 2 go home 2 that munter. She sed good luck with the exams and i told her 2 fuck rite of.

june mum sez that if i wont to keep smocking then i will hav to start gettin fags for myself becoz im costin her 2 much. i only eat for Source: stock.xchng

15 minats a day. i cant be costin her that much. sean sed hed keep me in fags if i kept him in bjs. like a business. i wonder wot else i can get for bjs. i like smocking but peeple tell u not 2. like in exams. may b thay shood think about the peeple wot smock a bit more and then i woodnt hav 2 get slung out for liting up. its there folt. thay dont even giv u a brayk. so im not goin 2 eny more exams. so thats scool dun and i can consentrayt on bein a star. been workin rearly hard on this book as well like jordon. Gonna go 2 that book shop wetherspoons wen its dun to sell it.

jully i didnot arks mum about a hola-

day this year. shed only say that if my good for nuttin dad hadnot got cort last year wed b able 2 go 2 blackpool agen. I hate it wen she slags him of. may b if she got lifted insteed of him wed all b a lot happier. At leest id be able 2 go 2 blackpool. Its proper fancy their. Sean said that hes got a mate called uncle len hoo wood sort me out for the tit and lip job if i kept him in bjs. xcept wen i saw him he sed that bjs proberblee woodnt cover the hole cost so if i gave him a jump that wood be better. makes sense. xcept he sed that just wunce woodnot cover it. fine by me. xcept he sed that if he got sum other blokes in id have my tits and lips in no time. so its all goin well.

my life by Hayley Sherman now ive got lots of muny i can buy vodcka insteed of that cheep coop sider. i also bort sum new cloths. shoos. maycup. and that facepeel stuff wot all the other celebratys have.

argust saw chelsea the other day. i wood update u on her thies but she had them hidden under the most ugly scirt ive ever seen. i think shes been taken over by aliens or summat. she sed she didnt wont eny of my vodcka and it all fell into place. shes jellos becoz ive got lots of muny and she has to cover her chunks with a scirt made of certans. and next month shes got to spend all her time at another scool xcept this 1 makes you make dinner all the time. id be jellos 2 i spose. but i woodnt be so stoopid. been spending a lot of time standin in town. Proberblee the eesiest way of gettin famos is just to stand about and wate to be disckuvered. I do lots of different poses and posishons and i wark up and down in my new cloths. sum times blokes arks me how much and i tell them 2 fuck rite of. sum times peeple shout my name out becoz thay no it. that will b wot its like all the time wen im famos. and i love it. sum 1 neerly disckuvered me but then did not. but its only a mater of time. get this. mum sez i gotta move Issue 19

June 2011

out. sommat about seans mate uncle len and the other blokes always nockin up for me and my bed sprigs makin noiz. not my folt that she bort me a crap bed. more like she wonts to move her butters boyfrend in. gonna tel me dad and hell proper batter him wen he gets out. eny way uncle len has got sum rooms were sum other girls stay so im gonna move their. i dont even hav to pay rent or nuffin.

septemba really funny. went and stood by the scool gates wen all them other muppets had 2 go back 2 scool. it woz reerly quiete when every 1 woz in there lessons so i just hung around and shouted stuff wen i saw eny 1. it was quit a larf so i go there quit a lot now and shout stuff. nuthin thay can do about it. old fat arse faulkner came over and sed i spend more time ther than when i woz their. i told her to fuck rite of. havenot safed much muny but u can get a caterlog and pay each month and then u get free cloths and shit like celebratys do wen they go to prada. so i mite do that. 1 of the girls in the next room is up the duff and uncle len sez shes got to get out so im movin into a biger room. woooo hoooo. uncle len sed that heill hold on 2 sum of my muny for me 2 help me save more quickker for tits

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and lips. uncle len has met me a lot more of his frends. cant go back to the scool becoz of the polees pigs. still will tho.

octoba im 17 now. mum didnot cum and see me on my birfday. chelseas mum sed that mum thort i woz a prostititoot. i hit the fuckin seelin. chelseas mums still on cock tho so she mite be rong but its just like me mum to lissen to wot eny 1 else sez but me. havenot seen her sinse i moved out. but i dont care. im 17 now and I dont need a mum tellin me wot 2 do eny way. Cant think of eny thing else to rite.

novemba decemba havenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t ritten for a wile. not much happenin. cant wait until the new yeer.

jannuary my name is kylie black. of corse u will no me by my stage name by the time u read this book, but at the moment im, kylie. 17 years old and waiting 2 b a star. i dont no how i did it yet, but this is gonna b my year And if your reading this book it means that i suckseededâ&#x20AC;Ś

Gold Dust 23

The Reflection Marie Fleurant

To those two men who are reflections of the same light.

I couldn’t see his face because the knife was sticking into my Adam’s apple...

The air. This soft movement of your hair… You fly. You float, like a mystical cloud of gold and silk. Your body is a delicate smoke that swirls to the sky. You shine. You are a ball of fire, a blinding fire that sucks up all the air in the room. Your body is incandescent, your body is violent. Your body hides a secret that shines through you, and spreads through the air in an intoxicating scent of amber. You were dancing that night.

open it.” “Bangles!” I said after tearing up the paper. “You like them?” “I love them!” I shouted. “They’ll be perfect for the wedding! My outfit is just the same colour, how did you know?” “I know everything,” he replied and gave me a playful smile. He was a tall, upright man with a proud nose and glowing face. His eyes, with their typical almond shape, were like those painted on the Indian emperors’ portraits. Like them he wore a moustache and had

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The Sun “You can’t see!” he said to me. “I won’t!” “Promise you won’t cheat!” “I promise.” Immediately I closed my eyes and he put his palms on my hips to drive me through the house. I could still smell coriander and turmeric on him. The sun was filtering through my fingers. Sometimes, through my eyelids, I could catch a quick ray of golden

light. We were moving slowly, swaying, skin to skin, to an unknown destination. He asked me to stand still. “Don’t move!” he shouted from somewhere. His voice sounded so far now. Already I was missing the warmth of his body next to me. I rolled up in my shawl, imprisoning his spicy sent under my skin. “Where is this surprise?” “Right here,” said his voice in front of me. “Open your eyes.” Suddenly I was drowning in a sea of colours. The whole garden was covered with saffron garlands and enchanting lights. “Shamar!” I whispered, stunned. “Do you like it?” “Are you kidding me? It’s magical! Did you do all this?” “Of course not,” he replied and laughed. “The idea was mine but, really, the girls did all the work. You know I’m not an artist!” “It’s amazing.” “I have something else,” he added while running to the table to get a little bag. “There,

The Reflection by Marie Fleurant a dignified, noble stature. He had short, neat hair that he would only let grow when his science preoccupations grew larger than him. In those particular moments, nothing else in the world would matter, not even the hair. Nor me. He was the type of man who inspired respect naturally, without even having to say a word. All over town everybody treated him as a prince as soon as he entered a room. But he never asked for anything. That was the beauty of his irradiating person, and, I guess, the reason why people valued him so much. He put the bracelets on my left arm, where they met an old couple of silver jewels that hadn’t left me since the age of fifteen. “Now you need a matching necklace!” he added. “Please, if I wear more jewelry you’ll mistake me for a

Christmas tree!” He had a tender laugh. “My neck is already taken anyways!” He nodded and looked at me for a long time. “Are you having a stroke?” I asked. This time he laughed for real. “ I was having a moment!” “I’m sorry, you’re so old, I thought I was losing you!” I closed the sentence with a wink while he laughed again. “Come on! I’m not that old!” “Thank you for the bangles. They are beautiful.” “I’m glad you like them. Now let’s go inside before it gets dark!” And he rolled his arm around my waist to take me back to the house. His warm lips kissed my forehead and my body melted into his for an instant, while the red sun was slowly drowning into the night. I It is a perfume. A deep intoxicating scent of amber. It is the tingling sound of small bells, at each and every step. It is the lascivious move of hips you can still see when you close your eyes. Like a negative shadow printed on your eyelids. It is a caress going along your spine each and every night. A thrill shaped as a woman. I disappear before even appearing. I am a sway-

Issue 19

June 2011

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ing image, I lay in red silk and crystal. I am here. I have eyes who stare at me. Dark and pure, in a casket of velvet skin. I breath, I cry. I do not know any more who is staring at me in that mirror. Tears run down my neck, I see myself, I see the red lips and the ebony hair. I see the beautiful veil decorating my head, and the jewelry. I shine like a red star. I feel like my body is waking up from anesthesia after being cut into pieces. My chest is on fire. I am burning from inside. I choke, I am suffocating. I rip off my necklace, smash it to the floor, I scream in silence. I am imploding in monstrous pain. I can still hear the music downstairs. Oh drums and cithars! I can see all the girls spining around with their playful attitude, the house drowning under flowers. I can see both of their faces, I am holding their bodies. Both of them, as if they were only one again. And I don’t exist anymore. The Moon “I’ve missed you,” said his voice. I turned around and faced his noxious smile. There he was in the candlelight, wearing a deep blue kameez and white shalwar, nonchalant as he always was. “Here’s my one and only!” I said and smiled to him while 25

The Reflection by Marie Fleurant he was walking towards me to hug me. “Where did you disappear to?” “I was very busy,” he answered. I looked into his eyes. “A girl?” “My love, you know you’re the only one in my heart!” said his playful smile while he was bringing a hand to his heart in a very theatrical gesture. “Maybe, but not in your bed!” He laughed and invited me to sit down. It was my uncle’s restaurant, where I used to dance sometimes. The place was closing down, therefore there were only the two of us remaining there, sitting around a tired candle. He took my hand. “So… Fill me in!” “There’s nothing new!

Wedding preparations and everything. Shamar has been acting quite strange, I think he is up to something. Do you know about anything?” “If I did you know I wouldn’t tell you!” “Oh come on! Is he preparing a surprise for the service?” “I said I wouldn’t blab!” “Come on!” “Aziman!” he said with a serious tone. “You know the rule. I don’t say anything about Shamar!” “That’s so unfair!” “So, is this a new sari?” “Don’t change the subject!” “I have to, we’re finished with the other one,” he said and then leaned a bit toward me. “You look very pretty.” I looked away briefly, just

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so he didn’t see that I was blushing. “Yes it’s a new one. Why did you come tonight?” “What, aren’t you happy to see me?” I looked at him for a second. He was a tall man with a perfectly harmonious face. His brown eyes, shaped as thin almonds, were looking back at me, whereas his slender lips were bent in a timid smile. He had a long, straight nose and messy hair that was quietly dancing in the evening breeze. He was adorable and mysterious at the same time, funny, charming and arrogant but just enough to be desirable. In short he was the man all the women were fighting to have, and all the men secretly wanted to be. Except Shamar, and this was why they complemented each other so well. I could always feel that they secretly admired each other’s qualities, maybe sometimes they envied each other’s for a second, but there was no ounce of jealousy between them. They were like two pieces of the same soul. “I’ve missed you Munir!” I said, finally. I leaned toward him and put my head on his shoulder. He held me for some time. His skin had a light, spellbinding scent of sandalwood and patchouli. I put my nose against his neck, closed my

The Reflection by Marie Fleurant eyes, I just wanted to disappear in the touch of his body. “You’re amazing, Aziman,” he said suddenly. “I know,” I replied, smiling. “I mean it. You are...” He paused, “Never mind.” His hand caressed the line of my jaw and landed on my hair while he was staying quiet for a moment. I sat up, surprised. “What’s happening?” He stared at me for a minute with a melancholic eye then said: “There’s only one thing in the world I envy him for…” “What is it?” He smiled. “You know the rule.” “Munir!” “Let’s get you back home,” he said while standing up. “It’s almost sunrise.” We We were a three-headed person. When I was six my family moved next to Shamar’s, that is how I met him, but he and Munir had known each other forever. They were four years older than me but, somehow, age never made a difference between us. We were one. I don’t know how and when I fell in love with Shamar, maybe it was a natural evolution of feelings, but I know precisely where and how I fell in love with Munir. We all know. And Issue 19

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maybe it was also a natural evolution of feeling, if I loved one I had to love the other, as they are incomplete without each other. And I am without them. We are the same person put in different bodies. Munir is me, Shamar is Munir, I am them. I carry both of them inside me. We feel, we breath, we think the same. We are three shadows of one body touched by the light.

“Please don’t finish,” he said. “There’s no discussion about me. This is ridiculous, you know I don’t fall in love anyways!” He looked away, just so I didn’t see that he was lying. “Maybe we should come back,” I murmured. “I feel a bit cold.” He nodded and rowed back to the riverside as I was hiding my tears.

“Are you in love with me?” I asked him one night. We were in his little fishing boat, it was a summer night, two days before the wedding. The pale moon was sprinkling on us ashes of light that were quietly floating on the river, like little diamonds. I saw on the water the reflection of his face turning dark. He looked away but didn’t turn back to face me and remained silent for some time. “Munir?” “I do not want to have you,” he said suddenly. “He is going to marry you, you chose him and I am happy about that. I am happy for him… and for you.” I was stunned. Completely thrown out of my own body. Maybe I loved Munir, but the perspective of him loving me back had never occurred to me. “But I didn’t choose him… I always thought that you… This is why…”

The Light It’s a warm and cold feeling of abandon. Suddenly there’s nothing any more, only silence. Only the impression of floating on the ocean. The whole body is bathed in light, even pain dries up eventually. Only the air remains, nice and soft, caressing a velvet skin washed by tears.

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She She is a goddess, a swan of gold and silk. When she dances, she shines through every pore of her skin. She glows a natural, simple, fair beauty. She fills a room, even when she’s not there. I can feel her mystical perfume on me, I can see through her. She is in me, I am in her. I own her body, I know every inch of her. I insufflate every move of hers, she swirls out of my mouth like smoke of a cigarette. She is a dazzling queen and I, I am kneeling before her. 27

The Reflection by Marie Fleurant She is a vision, a mirage. Sometimes I even wonder if she is real. She comes and goes, one snap, one second and she is gone. She doesn’t walk, she sways her curves on an invisible melody. I breathe her, and then I can feel her dancing in my stomach, lying on my heart. Holding my breath in her hands. She is a dream that I meet in my sleep, and there only I can touch her body with my lips, I can make her be what I want her to be. My wife, that I hold every night until she runs away with the light.

the terrace, panicked and cried out. She ran to her husband but was in such shock that she collapsed in his arms. “What is going on?” shouted the bride’s father. So Shamar, Munir and all the men rushed outside but suddenly, the groom and his friend froze. They could see her mehendi decorated feet at the corner of the window. Munir knew, he immediately hid his face into his hand, held a scream in his chest and caught the voluptuous image of her dancing in his mind. But Shamar… Shamar seemed to walk out of his body and slowly went to the terrace, repelling with a simple movement of hand everybody who would try

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The Air It happened on a wedding day. The party had already started in the beautifully decorated family house. Flowers were flowing from everywhere. Guests were singing and playing joyful music as the young girls were dancing, playful, in their colorful saris. The tables were filled with celebration food, the families were gathered, everyone was enjoying naively. “What if the story was different?” she had said that night on the boat. “What if I had been yours? Do you think he would have let me love you? Don’t you think he would have fought for me?” Munir stayed silent at first but when she ordered him to reply, he sighed and said:

“He would never fight against me, as I would never fight against him.” “Don’t you love me enough to fight for me?” “Don’t you love him enough to understand what this is about? ” “I will not choose between the two of you!” Suddenly I threw myself at him, terrified of losing him. He slowly pushed me back and caressed my face with his hand. “You’ve made a choice already, Aziman.” I thought for a second and caressed his face in the exact same movement he had grazed mine. He looked just like Shamar. The groom was in the main room, by the little stage where he would soon sit with his fiancé for the ritual blessings. His whole self was glowing in a beautiful, golden-brown suit. He turned and smiled to his friend, nervous to meet his bride. Munir, in his dark green suit, smiled back and put a reassuring hand on his shoulder. Maybe he said something, but Shamar didn’t hear because just at this moment a terrible scream shattered the ambience. The music stopped immediately. “What happened?” said the groom. As he was looking around, he saw a woman running from

to stop him. And there she was, laying in front of him in her red blooded sari, thrown in a field of sparkling smashed bangles. His bride.

Gold Dust

Think Twice What comfort could he offer this great gal for whom the standard monkey-on-the-back, with its mugging and chattering and unspeakable habits, would be no match? No, her beast would be a creature of mythic proportions, a souped-up crossbreed like a gryphon poised to swoop down screeching and whisk her off in its talons or slink up purring only to snarl and claw if she kicked it away. And to marry her would be to marry that beast. But to her mind, the thought of “not-using-ever-again-amen” was, she didn’t know, like being a cat burglar, right?, and you’re going along, doing your thing, springing from roof to roof and ledge to ledge until, mid-leap, you get a whim to go straight, and —poof!—that next ledge vanishes and you freeze in a queasy plummet. But, see, if you can think quick and seize the option of taking a hit—if you really need it— you’ll cheat the smash and go soaring aloft … on the rush and rustle of gryphon wings. Jeanie Galeazzi

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Of Readers and Vampires by Vicky Thompson Features writer Vicky Thompson investigates the current Vampire craze in teenage fiction... No matter what age you are, the chances are that you have heard about the vampire craze that is currently sweeping the nation. Whether it’s vampire fiction or films, the craze really has taken the Western world by storm. Mostly capturing the young adult audience, these stories are equally loved by many adults as well. I’m sure most young adults in the country have an opinion on vampire fiction, inspiring many to read and even some to try their hand at writing it themselves. Although the origin of this vampire trend is open to debate, after interviewing other young adults who had read some variation of vampire fiction I came to the conclusion that the craze is largely due to the Twilight series by Stephanie Meyer. Twilight is the Harry Potter for vampire lovers, quickly becoming one of the most famous series of books across all countries from America to India and Australia. Twilight combines our love for the supernatural and our love for a tale of romance. Following the story of main characters Bella and Edward, Twilight seems to encapsulate everything that goes to make up vampire fiction, including supernatural love and a few supernatural battles along the way. Some of the interest for Twilight may also spring from recent films that were extremely popular. But whether you are Team Edward or Team Jacob you cannot deny that a love for the supernatural has swept through our nation. The questions I set out to answer were: ‘Why Vampires?’, and ‘Why now?’. I attempted 30

some research, which just proved how many people are vampire lovers, as I searched the hundreds of vampire-dedicated websites. The only answers I could find to these questions were simply the appeal of things like Twilight and the Vampire Diaries, yet when I began to think about it I realised that we have always had a great interest in the supernatural. Even dating back to the 1600s when Macbeth was written. Macbeth’s choices are a result of a meeting with three witches. Also, during these times more people were convinced that the supernatural existed. They conducted simple tests to see whether suspected witches sank or floated. If a ‘witch’ floated they were burned. Maybe our love for the supernatural stems from way back then, recently turning into a love for vampires? Maybe it comes from things such as Dracula and Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Witches, ghosts or vampires – it would seem we have a love for anything out of the ordinary. We don’t want the world to be too boring and predictable. Whatever the reason, vampire fiction has taken off enormously during the last couple of years. Vampire Diaries and True Blood have both been extremely popular series. But why do we, as a nation, love vampires so much? Maybe it’s because we love to use our imagination, or because we love the idea of an unseen world. Maybe because they have the ability to drag us into a universe that is almost, but not quite, parallel to our own. Vampires somehow evoke our sympathy – perhaps because they are surrounded by such darkness and mystery

Of Readers and Vampires we feel they need to be loved by somebody. Maybe it’s just because half our population find vampires sexy. Or maybe it’s something deeper than that, a side of ourselves that we don’t understand. Whichever way you look at it, the vampire craze seems set to continue, with the current trend encouraging lots of young writers to write vampire fiction. It has been a great way of getting young people and adults into reading and writing, leading to skills that will serve them

well in their future lives. Continuing the vampire theme there follows a review of Rebecca Mazel’s first novel Infinite Days and an interview with the author. Hopefully we will continue our love for the supernatural and pass it on to future generations. Our love for the supernatural and its powers is indeed ancient and shows no signs of going away.

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June 2011

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Review

Infinite Days by Rebecca Maizel (MacMillan Children’s Books, 2010) £4.33 400 pages Reviewed by Vicky Thompson

have never been greatly fussy over the genre of book I read, and generally I am open to any style or genre, although I had always said that ‘vampire fiction’ was not really my cup of tea. As an exception I read the Twilight series and found myself enjoying them. So when asked to write about the vampire craze I was slightly apprehensive as I had never really got into this genre of writing, with those one or two exceptions. I had no idea how to go about choosing a book to review, although I knew I needed something relatively new. Walking into the book shop I picked the first book I saw from the ‘Vampire’ section. I think it must have been the striking, unique cover that caught my eye. In the shop I quickly Googled the author and found out that this was Rebecca Maizel’s first novel. I was ex32

cited to see a new author’s take on ‘Vampire Fiction’ and keen to see whether it followed the stereotype that I had always had of this particular genre of writing. As it turned out, I was wrong to think that Infinite Days was going to be just another vampire novel. Infinite Days presents the story of Lenah, a vampire who has only one wish – she wants to become a human once again. The novel is the story of her highs and lows as a new human. After her vampire lover grants her wish, the book follows Lenah’s attempts to fit in, and her first experience of human love. Lenah has several love interests: her true vampire lover, Rhode; a Wickham High School classmate, Tony; and the school heartthrob, Justin Enos. Creating the perfect combination of popular girls and regular classmates, Rebecca mixes vampire life with teenage life as Lenah settles into her new school. Rebecca also adds the right amount of comedy so that you have to chuckle to yourself at some of Lenah’s silly moments. Rebecca’s ability to add humour is a big bonus and a complete contrast to your typical ‘dark’ vampire story. After a few chapters I found that I was enjoying the book more and more, reading as many as six or seven chapters at a time. I read it through an English lesson and remember feeling put out when I had to stop and go to my next lesson. I fell in love with each individual character from Lenah’s school and

Review: Infinite Days by Rebecca Maizel

coven. I also love how the book manages to balance perfectly the amount of time Leah spends at school with the time she spent previously as a vampire. The stories from her time as a vampire are often set in motion by a single memory or something that holds a significance for Lenah. But they also give you an insight into her time as a vampire and how she has changed during the transition period. The stories also tell you how Lenah became a vampire, and how she turned so many others into vampires in her previous life. I think this adds a certain depth to the story as you find out bits of information which seamlessly link the main story together. As Lenah discovers who she is in the world and what she means to others, she also discovers the world of mortals for the first time in hundreds of years. As she falls in love with the rain and other new experiences you also find yourself appreciating the true beauty that’s all around you. I think this book would be perfect for young adults, and not only those who love vampire fiction. I also feel that Infinite Days would be the right choice for anyone who is interested in reading their first vampire novel. I hon-

estly feel that anybody could get lost in the world of Infinite Days. Rebecca has combined the perfect amount of vampire tales with the perfect amount of high school fiction centred around romance, gossip and the normal teenage things that make all high schools so alike. Infinite Days does not have any confusing ‘vampire talk’, so would be perfect for a reader who has experienced very little ‘Vampire Fiction’. Like me you may find that you become engrossed without expecting to be. I was under the illusion that Infinite Days was just going to be ‘another’ vampire novel. I was very wrong. There is something about this book that cannot be explained. It is everything a perfect vampire novel should be, mixing love, beauty and everything vampire. Forget Team Edward and Team Jacob, the new upcoming teams shall be Team Justin and Team Tony. Not forgetting Team Rhode. I would encourage you all to go and buy a copy of Infinite Days no matter whether you are interested in the vampire genre or not. Infinite Days is anything but your typical vampire novel. Gold Dust

Find out more Rebecca’s website http://rebeccamaizel.blogspot.com Rebecca’s blog http://rebeccamaizel.com

Expected publication: 21 June 2011 by St Martin’s Griffin (320 pages)

Vampire Queen series Rebecca’s next book in the Vampire Queen series is Stolen Nights (see right)

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Interview:

Rebecca Maizel

Vicky Thompson quizzes vampire author Rebecca Maizel... GD: What was your biggest inspiration for ‘Infinite Days‘? RM: I connected to my main character, Lenah’s voice. It was so strong; and sinister and tragic. I wanted to tap into that sorrow and darkness. I wanted to bring this person, whoever she was back out to light. It turned out that she was a vampire and thematically, it worked. Every person out there has done something they aren’t proud of. And whatever that thing is, they have to live with it - forever. That’s Lenah but times about a million! I just started writing one day and there she was with a motive, a purpose, and some really scary enemies. GD: Have you always been a fan of vampires and the supernatural? RM: Before writing Infinite Days, I had never read a vampire book before. I know it sounds weird. I read a lot of short stories and YA novels but never vampire novels. After a draft of Infinite Days was finished, I went to the bookstore and bought whatever else I could find, I wanted to know what else was in the genre. What else I was up against, you know? Now I am a huge fan of Twilight, House of Night, Firelight series, etc. I love paranormal! GD: Would you call Lenah a classic vampire? If not, what makes Lenah different for you? RM: Classic? No. I created a lot of my own "rules" for Infinite Days. She doesn't sleep in a coffin and she can be in the sunlight the older she gets. She doesn't have super speed though she does have heightened eye sight. When creating my vampires, I really thought about my them in terms of the story. I took away the sense 34

of touch and that was the biggest difference in my vampires. They literally lack the sense of touch. I knew more than anything that Lenah would need a reason to want to be human. The stakes would have to be high – if she didn’t desire it more than anything else in the world, more than eternity with her love, Rhode, it wouldn’t pay off for the reader why she was at Wickham Boarding School in the first place. So I asked myself: what is the worst thing about Lenah’s existence? What is the one thing she wants more than anything else that is specifically human? To feel emotions and to touch. So I took that away from her as a vampire. By deadening the senses it only added to her isolation from the rest of the world. GD: In ‘Infinite Days’ Lenah discovered the world as a human. Did you find this difficult to write or did it remind you of the true beauty of the world?

Interview: Rebecca Maizel RM: I wrote the book with the intention of investigating a character's journey as she re-discovered the beauty of the world. I did this 100% on purpose. I wanted to write the book as a discovery book and a book where a character literally comes back out into the light of day. She feels, touches, and falls in love. I loved that Lenah was able to uncover this within herself. GD: Did you prefer writing about Lenah’s Wickham acquaintances or Lenah’s coven? Why? RM: I liked to write both. One storyline couldn't exist without the other. The purpose of the coven scenes were to highlight the changes that Lenah was going through at Wickham - and vice versa. I have to admit, it's fun to write evil Lenah. She was so reprehensible that it's fun as a writer to go there. GD: When writing do you set out with a clear plan or do you just see where the characters take you? RM: It depends. I think both. I have to know the major arc of the character (where they will end up at the end of the book) and knowing that usually helps the characters dictate what will happen in the scene. It also helps each individual scene have resonance. Each scene then will link to the main theme of the story. GD: I love how every character in Lenah’s coven is so individual. Was it hard to create characters that would not get classed as typically ‘vampish’? RM: First of all, thank you! Gavin, Heath, Vicken and Song each had a very specific purpose. I wanted to highlight Lenah's desire to create a coven of "perfect' vampires. Vampires who could and would protect her if they needed to also; vampires who would allow her to be the most powerful vampire in existence. The more skilled they were, the better Lenah's chances at finding prey as well as controlling her environment. I Issue 19

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hoped their unique qualities would help them stand out as individuals and not just villains with fangs. GD: Do writers of vampire fiction for young adults ever get attacked by the religious right in America, who made such a fuss about the supernatural elements in the Harry Potter books, fearing they would lead the youth of America away from Christianity and presumably into some kind of paganism or devil worship? RM: I haven't been involved with any of that (luckily). If people have a problem with the vampires in Infinite Days then they've missed the greater thematic point of the story. Lenah doesn't desire darkness - she desires humanity. I hope people can see that. GD: Do you think you will continue to write ‘vampire fiction’ or do you think you would like to branch into another genre? RM: I write a lot of short fiction, have finished a realistic fiction novel and am starting a new fantasy. I write a lot of different genres. All for young adults - :) GD: Why do you think stories about Vampires and the Supernatural have become so popular during the past few years? RM: I've been asked this question before but I always feel like my answer is a bit strange. Fantasy has always been popular but we live in a society, at least here in the States, which is fixated on both, simultaneously, eternal youth and violence. We want to live forever or at least look like we could. But we also have TV shows and the nightly news which dramatizes and sensationalize murder, victims, and violence. I think there's a common ground somewhere in there. I don't know how to articulate it quite yet but it's somewhere within that, I think. I hope this answer makes sense :)

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Gold Dust 35

Visiting Time Corinna Weyreter Jack had been coming to the hospital often enough to recognize its captives...

ack hated coming here. The moans and whimpers of the patients bounced unnervingly between the white walls and linoleum floors, trapped between the cold, hard surfaces. These bleak echoes of misery surrounded him, diminishing then rising in relentless waves, never fading to any kind of peace. The friendly nurse led him into the common room as usual. She was foreign, like the others, but she always smiled, unlike the others. Jack thought she was from the Philippines, or Thailand perhaps, somewhere exotic, somewhere he would never go. He sat down in one of the easily wiped down leatherette armchairs that were dotted around the room: red, green, and orange, like traffic lights. He suspected they had a hidden psychological meaning, that they were a test of some kind. Choose the colour chair to reflect your state of mind. He glanced down at the seat; green, surely a good sign. Jack looked around the room. Apart from the Freudian 36

chairs there were a few tables pushed up against the walls and in one corner a fat television stood silently on four spindly legs. There was something menacing about its blank screen, as though it was the one doing the watching, the one being entertained. It was never switched on when he came to visit. They probably only allowed it in the evening, something to calm the patients before bed. A non-chemical sedative to numb the brain. Jack had been coming to the hospital often enough to recognize its captives, he even knew the names of some, for a few he could tell their stories. Several were with him now in the common room, some just whiling away the hours, others waiting for visitors to bring them a glimmer of hope from the world outside. Old Tom sat hunched over a chessboard, pulling his straggly, grey beard as he debated his next move with himself. He wore striped pyjamas and a worn out toweling dressing-gown the colour of dried mud that Jack had never seen him without. By the win-

dow young Milly paced up and down, painfully thin beneath her baggy tracksuit bottoms and chunky-knit jumper. She chewed on her fingernails while she waited for her parents to arrive, her eyes darting around the room, expecting trouble. Every time Jack was here her parents were too, her father looking helpless, her mother close to the edge herself. Milly was too young to be in a place like this. Jack wanted a miracle cure for Jason, but he wanted it for Milly too. He caught her eye and smiled, but she jerked her head away and stared intently at the open doorway, as though she would flee through it if only she could find the courage. Deflated, Jack turned and looked out of the window. It was pouring with rain now, he would get soaked on the way home. It had been raining when they brought Jason here. How long ago was that? One month, two? Jack felt as if heâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;d been coming here every weekend for years, yet at the same time his memory of the very first visit seemed so fresh, like a new experience that had only just been

Visiting Time by Corinna Weyreter

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walked away he sat down. Jack was disturbed to see that he had chosen a red chair. He couldn’t be doing as well as he’d thought. ‘How are you, Jason?’ he asked, finding his voice again, pulling himself together. ‘Not bad,’ he said, looking Jack straight in the eye, challenging almost. He was acting amiably enough, but Jack sensed the underlying hostility. He knew Jason was still angry at having been sent here, at being locked up, at Jack for assuming control of him, the older brother. ‘I did have a touch of flu at the beginning of the week but I’m cured now, you don’t have to worry about catching it from me,’ Jason insisted with a smile. The confidence was still there and Jack wanted to take it as a sign that his brother was

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getting well, that he was becoming himself again, but something was wrong. He could tell that Jason was mocking him and this gave him an irrepressible need to strike out, to cut his brother down to size, a size he could manage. ‘You must have caught it from someone in here. It’s full of sick people after all,’ he said, ensuring his words were delivered with sharp edges. ‘Maybe,’ Jason replied, clearly taken aback. With his confidence dented, an awkward silence stretched between the brothers, leaving each on opposite sides of a gap they didn’t know how to bridge. And then the friendly nurse returned, saving them with two cups of tea that she placed on the low table separating them. Jason thanked her and she smiled at him; Jack’s heart contracted un-

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filed in his brain. It was awful leaving his brother here, but he had no choice. He’d waited too long as it was to get him help, hoping the symptoms would go away, but they’d only got worse and Jason had become a danger to himself. The doctors said he was unlikely to hurt anyone else, but how could they be sure? Doctors could see if a leg was broken, but how well could they diagnose the mind, invisible and mysterious, in each of us unique? Even if they removed the top of Jason’s skull and peered at his brain they wouldn’t see the thoughts being generated, the private hell of incessant voices, manipulative and insistent. A hell that was real to Jason, more real than the world everybody else lived in, and one in which he lived alone. The horror of this began to upset Jack and he gripped the arms of the chair over and over, creating slippery patches of sweat beneath his hands. He wished they would bring Jason to him now, he wanted to do his duty and get out of here. At last the friendly nurse returned with Jason at her side. He smiled, he looked different. ‘Hello, Jack,’ he said, in a voice that was louder than normal. ‘Hello.’ Jack’s reply sounded quiet to his own ears, timid, as if his brother’s new confidence had been stolen from him. Jason hovered for a while, but when the nurse

Visiting Time by Corinna Weyreter pleasantly. ‘Oh, which one has the sugar?’ Jason called after her, drumming his fingers on the red armrest of his chair. Jack twisted to look behind him and saw the nurse put a hand to her mouth, her eyes fixed on Jason. ‘Sorry,’ she said, ‘I wasn’t thinking,’ and she walked back to the table and swapped the cups, not smiling any more. ‘It doesn’t matter,’ Jason said, coldly, Jack thought. ‘I’ve always had sugar in my tea, but not Jack. “Sweet enough,” Mum always said. Right Jack?’ The nurse forced a smile and glanced at Jack before walking away again. Jack had first noticed that there was something wrong with his brother when his sense of humour disappeared. He used to make light of everything, no problem was ever serious. Jason had always been relaxed, the kind of person others liked to be around because his calmness was contagious. Then, out of the blue, he started to get worked up over small things, things that usually sailed right by him: lighthearted jokes at his expense, friends turning up late for a night out or calling at the last minute to say they wouldn’t be coming. Jack had put it down to stress at work; he told Jason to take a holiday, but his brother insisted nothing was wrong. And he hadn’t been like 38

that all the time, he became his old self long enough for Jack to stop worrying. But then Jason started calling him at all hours of the day and night. ‘Someone followed me home,’ he would say, real panic in his voice. ‘They’ve been watching me for days, different people, but I know they’re working together. I think they want to kill me.’ Jack had managed to calm him down in the beginning, but when it took going to his house to prove that no one was watching him from the street it became obvious that his behaviour was driven by more than stress. Jason needed professional help. He had not come here willingly. He’d agreed to see the doctor, but he hadn’t been prepared to be sectioned, to lose his freedom. He accused Jack of betraying him. ‘You’re in on it, they got to you,’ he said, a disturbing mixture of anger and terror in his voice. ‘You’re not my brother,’ he’d spat as he was led away. It had hurt Jack, that parting shot, but what choice did he have? Jason had been ill, he would never have got better without help. But the man sitting opposite him was a stranger, that was clear to him now. He was not the brother who had been brought here and neither was he the one Jack

knew before he got sick. He was merely a shell of a person, there was no warmth, no soul within; he could see the emptiness in his eyes. What had they done to him? ‘Oh, that’s a lovely cup of tea,’ Jason said, placing the cup on its saucer with a noisy chink of china against china. ‘I needed that, it’s such a cold day. Why don’t you drink yours?’ Jack stared at the watery brown fluid in front of him. He knew it didn’t taste good, they made awful tea here. Why had Jason asked about the sugar? He never had sugar in his tea. It was Jason who their mother always claimed was “sweet enough”. Jack’s pulse began to race. His hands were sliding in puddles of sweat and he could feel beads breaking out on his forehead. He pulled at his shirt collar. It was so hot in here, there was no air at all. He looked around the room. Why was everybody staring at him? Was Jason after revenge now that he was cured? Or was he still sick, this seemingly normal exterior just a façade to fool the doctors, to fool him? Did he still believe there were people after him, that Jack was working for them? Had he put poison in Jack’s tea, had he somehow got the friendly nurse involved? Had he threatened her? He re-

Visiting Time by Corinna Weyreter membered her eyes when Jason had called after her. There had been shock in them, fear even. Yes, it had definitely been fear. There was no way he was going to touch that tea. ‘Are you feeling all right, Jack?’ his brother asked leaning towards him, only the table keeping him at bay. ‘Shall I call someone?’ ‘Leave me alone, I’m getting out of here,’ he snapped, and pushed his chair back, ramming his knees into the table as he stood up, spilling the tea. He headed for the door and saw two male nurses striding towards him, tall, broad, an impenetrable wall closing in. They couldn’t stop him from leaving, he was just a visitor. ‘Come on, Jack,’ one of them said, patronizing him, seizing his arm, ‘let’s go back to your room.’ ‘Let me go,’ Jack spat through gritted teeth, trying to wrench his arm free from the vice-like grip that clamped down on him the more he resisted. ‘Calm down,’ the second nurse said, grabbing hold of his other arm. Jack had known he shouldn’t come here, that it would be dangerous. Jason had tricked them into believing that he was well and must have made some kind of bargain, a trade. Jack saw his brother Issue 19

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now, doing nothing while he struggled. Jason was smiling, not his mouth, it was his eyes that betrayed him with a look of triumph, of a carefully laid plan bearing fruit. They were dragging Jack away from the common room, away from the front door, along an empty, sterile corridor. His own shouts bounced around him now, ringing in his ears; bleak, hopeless. Trapped. The muscular nurses forced him through an open door, a single bed stood marooned in a bare room, leather

best to sound reassuring. ‘Do you know what upset him? He’d been doing so well recently.’ ‘I’m not sure. He seemed a little agitated from the start. Then there was a mix-up with the tea and he just went crazy.’ ‘Perhaps you should wait a while before your next visit,’ the doctor suggested. ‘I thought we were making good progress, but this is a real setback. Why don’t you give us a month or so, see how we get on?’ ‘Well,’ Jason hesitated

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straps hung down to the polished floor. A doctor in a white coat came in after them, Jack’s sleeve was pulled up, a needle pierced his flesh. He watched helpless as the plunger was forced into the barrel, the fluid disappearing inside his body. He looked at the doctor’s face, saw the glint of power in his eyes, and then nothing. ‘Is he all right?’ Jason asked when the doctor came to talk to him. ‘We sedated him, he’s fine now,’ he said, doing his

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for a moment, ‘if you think it’s for the best.’ He walked to the front hall and got his coat. It was raining hard now, he would get soaked on the way home. He felt bad about leaving Jack here, but what could he do? He was still so ill, there was no doubt about that now. He also felt guilty about not visiting for a month and even more guilty about being glad of it. Jason hated coming here.

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Review

Reflections by Luigi Pagano (I*D Books, 2008 & Smashwords, 2010) $0.99 (e-book) Reviewed by Claire Tyne

eflections is a very neat collection of 80 poems by Luigi Pagano. The collection falls, for me, into three categories: humorous observations, poetical searchings through individual narratives and good old fashioned fables. I am particularly fond of the latter type of poem. It is evident from looking at Pagano’s collection that he is a writer, but more importantly a poet, who writes from his creative consciousness. There is no real emphasis on getting a poem (critically) correct through over emphasising technique, or using clever allegorical language. ‘4.30’ is one such poem that speaks volumes of the difficulty in the act of writing, and the buzz of a creative mind unable to sleep. It demonstrates the need to find a rhyme in order to get a poem down on paper, which Pagano does manage quite successfully in this instance, and by doing so finish the poem and perhaps put it to bed. ‘A Man for All Seasons’ gives a nod to Keats, as ‘Lost Innocence’ hints at Blake’s Songs of Innocence and Experience. Pagano’s reference to nursery rhymes and childhood experience, cou40

pled with the responsibility afforded to us as adults – and by turn the troubles this responsibility brings – is a recurring theme in poetical searchings. This is evident from the aeons of poets who have gone before us, and the many poets who are writing, and continue to write today. Pagano is certainly in good company. The individual narratives of ‘Fell Walking’, ‘On Hearing The First Cuckoo’ and ‘Clearing the Attic’ leaves one wondering about the characters contained within the limitations of verse. Are they real people imagined by the poet, or imagined people made real by Pagano’s pen? These narratives are straightforward; we are not left needing to re-read the lines over and over in order to gauge what the poem is trying to tell us. This does not mean, by any stretch of the imagination, that these works are not accomplished. In fact, it is quite the contrary. The simplicity of Reflections is what makes the gems hidden within the collection so appealing. Indeed, there are poems interspersed throughout that are nothing more than hysterical musings, or frankly observed instances of the banality of life itself (‘Age Concern’, ‘Original Sin’, ‘If Only’). These smaller snapshots of thought and verse make for a great mood elevator, encourage you to go back, re-read and pass on. I am left wondering whether the subject of ‘The Storyteller’ is Aesop or Pagano himself. The poem sits towards the end of the collection, comfortably nestled between ‘Only Dead Fish Go With The Flow’ and ‘On Stage’. Personally speaking, these three poems define Reflections for me: Pagano’s own take on fables, old proverbs and

Review: Reflections by Luigi Pagano what life - as both a poet, storyteller and man (or woman of course) – is. And how as a storyteller (or writer of poems, or walker of the boards) one comes to the conclusion that his or her own creative work can be shared with a readership whom can see the stories, and learn from the lessons, that are held within. The Reflections of this collection are, from what I can gather, similies for life; advice to stop and marvel at the world around us because life is short and poetry is simple.

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Find out more Luigi Pagano was born in Italy, then moved to England in 1961. He is married, has two daughters and lives in Handforth, Cheshire. Having dabbled in writing in his native country, he decided to resume this activity, as a hobby, on his retirement. He has published two collections of poems: one in 2005 entitled Idle Thoughts (available from Smashwords) and a second one in 2008 called Reflections. He is a member of I*D Writers Group based in Shotton, Flintshire. His work has been featured in various magazines and anthologies. A regular contributor to the websites ABCtales.com and UKAuthors.co.uk, he was ‘Writer of the Month’ on the latter in December 2005.

Luigi Pagano

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If he could talk If he could talk, What words would he choose, And to what ends would he shape them, To express thin sorrow at fleeting days, At lost summers and who pays Homage to sepia ideals. That cast iron range, the aunt who came to stay, And baking fresh smells whipping up the stairs, Noses chasing like butterflies. Though the aunt dies In time. And empty of her leaves something less, To be opened by a fresh set of eyes. Peel away the skin of then. Start again. If he could talk, What words would he chose, And to what ends would he shape them. Or perhaps say nothing. Finding in fact, little use for expression. Just a forlorn smile and eyes turned silently inwards. Robert Heath

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Stew People As she was talking at me I saw her baby cough up a sloppy load of puke and I waited for her to see it but she was just staring at me checking my eyes for interest as she barked on about vodka shots and Rob the mechanic, and Helen, the bitch who was flirting with Rob all last night, and there’s her baby burping out these chunky slops of green sick, I nod at the pram but she doesn’t even notice, too busy telling me how Helen slept with her sister’s Fiancé, that’s the kind of girl she is, what does Rob see in her, while her baby fingers a pea on its chin, goes cross-eyed trying to look at it and smiles. Tanner

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Review

Tony Benn Presents Gerrard Winstanley: a Common Treasury Edited by Andrew Hopton With an introduction by Tom Hazeldine (Verso Books, 2011) £8.99 ISBN: 978-0984098446 Reviewed by David Gardiner

s a student in Belfast in the late 1960s I fell under the spell of the writings of a 17th century pamphleteer and political activist named Gerrard Winstanley, and went on to spend more than a decade of my life trying to find or set up a commune based on his ideas. Back then almost nobody had heard of him, and perhaps not very many have now, but in the mid-1970s there was an apparent upsurge of interest, when the Kevin Brownlow and Andrew Mollo film Winstanley was released, and Leon Rosselson wrote The World Turned Upside Down, later popularised by Billy Bragg. Then about two years ago there seemed to be a further small swell of interest, with Winstanley re-issued on DVD and Blu-Ray by the British Film Institute, and the publication of Kevin’s 44

book about the making of the film, which we reviewed in Issue 15. Finally, last year the Oxford University Press brought out a complete collection of Winstanley’s writings – the first there has ever been – but in hard cover, with more than 1,000 pages and a recommended retail price of £198.00. Our little group in Belfast certainly could not have afforded that, but its appearance did make me wonder if, with the world economy in ruins and near universal disillusionment and revulsion at the consumer society and its destructive wastefulness, Winstanley’s socialism might be an idea whose time was drawing near. All those years ago in Belfast we knew of Winstanley’s writings only from snippets quoted in the works of others, articles in the anarchist weekly Black Flag, books by contemporary political commentators such as Christopher Hill, and the account of his life in David Caute's novel Comrade Jacob. That would have remained largely true for any present-day student radicals also, until Verso Books and Tony Benn, the maverick former Labour MP and minister, brought out this paperback collection of all Winstanley’s most important works for about one twentieth the price of the OUP collection. The selection concentrates on the period around the creation and destruction of the commune on St. George’s Hill, with modest though useful notes and a thoughtful and perceptive (though sadly very brief) introduction from Tony himself. Who then, was Winstanley, and what did he say that was so important?

Review: Tony Benn Presents Gerrard Winstanley Edited by Andrew Hopton He lived at the time of the English Civil War, which culminated in the execution of the king and the establishment of the so-called ‘protectorate’ of Oliver Cromwell, a man who declared himself the champion of the common people against the monarchy, the aristocracy and the landlords. It looked as though the status quo had come to an end and a real and profound change in the whole nature of English society was just around the corner. Everything was up for grabs. From this melting pot came the first reasoned account of a new vision of human society rooted not in hierarchy and exploitation but in equality, cooperation and mutual aid. A new way of understanding human relationships which has come to be called socialism. And the principal author of that vision was one Gerrard Winstanley, the son of a merchant trader from Lancashire, a Baptist (later a convert to Quakerism) and successful businessman in the clothing industry. In 1639 he married Susan King, the daughter of a London surgeon. When they were bankrupted in the Civil War and the family business destroyed, Winstanley’s father-in-law helped the couple to move to Cobham in Surrey, where Gerrard managed to find work as a cowherd. A highly literate, charismatic man and a compelling speaker, Winstanley began to gather around him a group of dispossessed people, the kind that are always left over from any war, and in January 1649 published a pamphlet called The New Law of Righteousness. In this elegantly worded tract, Winstanley expounded his radical vision of a society of total equality, without rulers, without private property, without armies or police forces, and perhaps most critically of all, without money: When this universal law of equity rises up in every man and woman, then none shall lay claim to any creature and say, This is mine, and that is yours. This is my work, that is yours. But Issue 19

everyone shall put their hands to till the earth and bring up cattle, and the blessing of the earth shall be common to all; when a man hath need of any corn or cattle, take from the next storehouse he meets with. There shall be no buying or selling, no fairs or markets, but the whole earth shall be a common treasury for every man… (The New Law of Righteousness 1649) Winstanley believed that the individual conscience of each one of us, when allowed to develop properly in a society not based on exploitation, would be law enough to ensure right conduct, industriousness and kindness towards our fellow creatures. What Jesus had preached as a more or less unattainable ideal, Winstanley embraced as a practical basis for human society. All of his political writing is contained in pamphlets, beautifully expressed in language that draws from the King James Bible in both its style and imagery, but contrary to what his critics have claimed is free from any mysticism or appeal to transcendental arguments. Winstanley was interested only in practical ways to organise human affairs on earth, he never referred to pie in the sky or eternal damnation, and his ‘visions’ were clearly a code for meditations in which he clarified his thoughts. Anticipating Rousseau, he believed that mankind was fundamentally good and loving, but corruptible when placed in an environment of greed and

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Review: Tony Benn Presents Gerrard Winstanley Edited by Andrew Hopton competition and fed bad ideas by those who would exploit their fellow creatures as a means to their own ends. Because Winstanley published his thoughts always in pamphlets addressed to particular groups (to the lords of manors, to Lord Fairfax and his Council of War, to the army, to the Parliament etc.) he never assumed that his readers had come across his ideas before, but rather that he needed to explain them anew, and hence kept returning to the same topics, often with new insights or answers to his critics, each pamphlet standing up reasonably well by itself. Because of this structure, a basic index of topics, allowing the reader to follow them from one pamphlet to the next, would have been a very useful addition to the collection. What Winstanley set out to do, let us make no mistake, was to overturn the whole of the existing order: governments, armies, lords of manors, kings and aristocrats; and establish in its place a society of perfect equality for all,

sharing all the riches of the earth, without leaders or money or privilege of any kind. He saw the creation of an abstract system of value, a currency or monetary system, as something that must inevitably lead to inequalities, to some individuals having a larger store of these counters than others, and therefore a development to be avoided. Ultimately, that was the only purpose that money served. Similarly the private ownership of land led inevitably to inequalities and exploitation. In the industrial society that followed, this concept would be translated by the Marxists into â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;the ownership of the means of productionâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;. Propriety, was brought into the Creation by your Ancestors by the Sword; which first did murther their fellow Creatures, Men, and after plunder or steal away their Land, and left this Land successively to you, their Children. And therefore, though you did not kill or theeve, yet you hold that cursed thing in your hand, by the

One of the sets of the film Winstanley (1975) 46

Review: Tony Benn Presents Gerrard Winstanley Edited by Andrew Hopton power of the Sword; and so you justifie the wicked deeds of your Fathers; and that sin of your Fathers, shall be visited upon the Head of you, and your Children, to the third and fourth Generation, and longer too, till your bloody and theeving power be rooted out of the Land. (…To the Lords of Manors 1649) He was under no illusion that this would be easy or quickly accomplished, and never made the mistake of later socialists of thinking that all that was necessary was a revolution in which the rulers would be overthrown and the power transferred to the ‘good guys’. Winstanley knew that there was no fast track to socialism, that the revolution that needed to take place was within the hearts of men and women. Anticipating Gandhi he insisted that the end had to be the means as well, that aggression and hostility were never to be met with the same, that the only way in which he and his followers could ever lead others was by their example and the force of their arguments. He and his ragged band of followers made their protest by cultivating and setting up homes on land they believed to be common, sewing crops and undertaking to share freely with one another all the fruits of their labour – hence they came to be known as ‘The Diggers’. As is well known, the commune that Winstanley set up on St. George’s Hill in Surrey survived for only about eighteen months, destroyed by the might of the clergy, the New Model Army and the ruling class, who quite rightly saw in it the seeds of something with the potential to rob them of their power and status for ever. Other communities elsewhere in England modelling themselves on St. George’s Hill were similarly crushed. Seldom has such might been assembled in the cause of overpowering an enemy so defenseless. That is the story of Caute’s book and of the film Winstanley, which space does not allow us to re-tell here. We note only the Issue 19

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irony that St. George’s Hill in Surrey is now a gated community for the super-rich, with its own golf course and house prices starting at £8,000,000. What this new volume gives us is a reasonably full and accessible account of the thoughts of one of the greatest of Englishmen – known to few, little understood or read in his native land, whose grave is unmarked and whose only statue is in Gorky Park. But this is exactly what is needed. His own words are what matter, not the commentaries and interpretations of others, and they are very nearly all here. My suggestion is that you don’t get bogged-down in the historical background or what modern commentators have written about him. Just read and think about what the man actually said. After almost 400 years his words still have the power to inspire each new generation that comes to them, and perhaps ultimately to change the world. And here I end, having put my Arm as far as my strength will go to advance Righteousness: I have Writ, I have Acted, I have Peace: and now I must wait to see the Spirit do his own work in the hearts of others, and whether England shall be the first Land, or some others, wherin Truth shall sit down in triumph. (A Bill of Account of the most Remarkable Sufferings that the Diggers have met with... 1650)

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Find out more The World Turned Upside Down: Radical Ideas During the English Revolution (Penguin History, 1991) by Christopher Hill Winstanley (a film by Kevin Brownlow and Andrew Mollo, 1975, reissued on DVD & BluRay by The British Film Institute, 2009)

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On finding your lover in the arms of another Stephen McQuiggan She strutted in, transforming the old checked lino into a catwalk... 1- HOW TO LOAD THE GUN. Debbie had strawberry blonde hair, powder blue eyes, and dimples that punctuated her synchronised face. Jack, the latest fly in her perfumed web, was overweight and balding. They were made for each other. The first time he saw her was in Vince’s Mini-Mart, she’d been buying nylons and he’d been ogling her from behind the peas. Her face suggested she was up for all manner of delightful sin; there weren’t even niche websites for what he’d like to do to her. For the rest of that week he resigned himself to the brutal reality that he may never see her again. Fear gnawed at him, urging him into uncharacteristic action, until in desperation he began to return to Vince’s on a nightly basis, praying for one more glimpse of the girl he had come to believe was a goddess, or a model at the very least. He felt uncomfortable, even strangely guilty, under the shopkeeper’s glare, so he pretended to browse quietly until 48

Vince turned his attention back to his paper. It was cold down by the milk and eggs; you could perish by the perishables. The sterile light made the steady stream of shuffling shoppers look like corpses. The distant drone of bland muzak made it feel even more like a mortuary. He ignored the hard tomatoes and wilting lettuces and went straight to the ready made, pre-packed sandwiches. Cheese and ham or a BLT? They all tasted like wet bread and he was too horny to eat. He found himself becoming bored more quickly than usual. Passing the time by the tinned baby food, engrossed in every apricot and carrot, every beef stew and halved peach label, he found himself seriously considering purchasing one for his supper when, with a click and a bell, the door opened and a vision appeared unto him over the crunchy peanut and cabbage. He sidled over to the magazines, the better to see her. He did his best to keep his eyes averted from the top shelf

that groaned under the weight of the promiscuous buttocks of nubile models smiling at their pay cheques. She strutted in transforming the old checked lino into a catwalk. Jack’s heart pounded as her blue dress swayed, his jaw fell slack as her full red lips pouted suggestively; Vince’s pen barely left the crossword. Her gaze wandered the store, stroking everything, resting on nothing. He froze, trying to blend into his surroundings; a successful endeavour for as she passed she made no sign that she noticed him. Yet she had, for despite his aloof stance it was obvious he was ultra aware of her presence. She felt the vein in her neck gallop, when she caught him staring; she felt like crying, she felt beautiful. He smelt her as she glided by, a subtle aroma of summer flowers that was stronger than the smell of mouse urine that was as much a part of the Mini-Mart as Vince himself. She moved so sleekly, shined so brightly; she was talc, she was diamond, he was

On finding your lover... by Stephen McQuiggan putty in her hands. He steeled himself to approach her as she stood by the freezer, obviously dumbfounded by the impressive selection of pizzas on offer. ‘Hi,’ he smiled, regretting it instantly. When he smiled he revealed the slush of his teeth, worn down like burnt tree stumps. When he talked it looked like he gnawed his gums the way a hamster gnaws the bars of its cage. His brother had told him that if you slept with your arse under your pillow then the Tooth Poof would get you, and that an itchy ass meant you were cutting a tooth; if you pulled it you bled starlight. He had avoided dentists ever since. ‘Hi,’ she conceded, the corner of her mouth twitching, whether a smile or a nerve disorder Jack couldn’t be sure. He could not take his eyes off her ears, they were so chewable, he could just bite and suck them, maybe even put a dab of Salad Cream or mayo on them first and She was looking at him strangely. ‘Oh God, have I something on my ear?’ ‘Yes,’ he said, watching her flick at it with the tips of her fingers making the fleshy lobes dance. ‘I mean, it’s gone now.’ She smiled, unmistakably this time, then turned her attention back to a deep pan chilli beef. He was about to slink away, feeling some heavy Issue 19

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duty self pity sink in, when she looked at him quizzically as if seeing him for the first time. ‘Do you like pizza?’ He nodded dumbly. The possibilities of this question were endless. ‘You can help me eat this then.’ She fluttered her exquisite lashes and handed him a loudly coloured box; like the ice beneath his hand, his heart melted. He watched as she strolled out the door. The thought struck him that she was just a freeloader after a quick snack, but then he imagined those lips, that mouth biting into a slice, sinking into it, and he was running to the counter clutching his pepperoni passport to paradise. On spotting him with a purchase Vince was a man re-

born. His lips parted, clamping themselves back somewhere near his ears in a layman’s approximation of a smile. Jack smiled back, contemplating how Vince must use a really hard toothbrush, the kind that really lacerate your gums, and how he should really invest in one, when he realised he had no money. 2 - DEALING WITH THE POLICE. Jack staggered home tripping on regrets. He stopped once again to check his watch, pressing a button to light up the dial so he could read the chunky digits; 10:31. He felt pleased with his achievement, and was about to attempt it again, when a sobering thought wiped the smirk from his face; Debbie, his wife. He

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On finding your lover... by Stephen McQuiggan was over two hours late. She would be lying in wait for him, ready to devour him with her acid tongue. The thought knocked him out of his drunken stride. What had happened to the girl he married? Was she really the same girl he had met in Vince’s , the goddess he had stolen a pizza for? She had watched him from outside the store, nearly wetting herself. Everything went so smoothly after that, even if his crotch had been soaked and the pizza was a crumpled mess. Yet the goddess had turned into a dragon just like her mother, always looking down her nose at him because she had a bit of cash behind her and he still worked on a building site. Well, money can’t hide everything my dear, certainly not those chasms in your face that those ‘beauticians’ have been shovelling foundation into for years; now that was back breaking work. Still, in the early days she had been so bloody sweet. They had been married two years later, at least he thought so; Christ, he’d better remember their anniversary or there would be a wailing and a gnashing of teeth. The honeymoon had dragged on for months, but now he viewed marriage the way a one legged man viewed a unicycle. As time slipped by he noticed changes. 50

She started keeping secrets, turning the telly over whenever the footy was on to watch some god awful soap; ‘serial drama,’ she would sniff. Whenever he argued with her, and Christ he hated this, she would just sit quiet as if she was above it all, as if she was better than him. She was turning into her ratbag of a mother. The girl he thought was a one off turned out to be as unique as a bean in a Heinz canteen. Jack felt his blood fizz. He may well be drunk but he knew who wore the trousers in his marriage, and it certainly wasn’t some uptight little bitch who hadn’t even the decency to shout back at him. No wonder he drank occasionally. She even had the nerve to bitch about that too.

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He lurched onward, turning the corner toward his house, pondering the inconsistency of devotion. He felt tantalisingly close to a breakthrough, climbing a rickety staircase in his drunken mind, trying to grasp a conclusion that tottered just out of reach. He fidgeted nervously with the keys in his pocket, already formulating excuses in his addled brain. He told himself not to be such a coward, then ploughed on regardless. It was the interrogation he couldn’t handle, the endless barrage of questions that could not be answered. Then, inevitably, the silence. In that silence he felt as useless as her mother said he was. It will work itself out he

On finding your lover... by Stephen McQuiggan thought, it’s just teething trouble that all marriages go through. He could land an office job, buy a swanky car and they could start the family she had her heart set on. But these were not his dreams. They were cuckoo dreams laid in his head by her and her friends. Her looks had went to hell too; she couldn’t even be bothered making an effort any more. Other men’s wives did, went out of their road, spent a fortune on clothes and cosmetics, but not her. Darren’s wife was a real dish, and didn’t Darren know it. You could see it in his eyes every time they went round to theirs for a drink. At times like that he felt so ashamed of Debbie, felt like the pauper bringing the tin of

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spaghetti to church on Harvest Sunday. Things are going to change he decided as he reached the front door. Thinking once more of Darren’s wife he rammed the keys into the lock and put his weight against it. She was on the phone in the hallway, her hair tied up with a pair of bikini bottoms; he was about to interrupt her but it was obvious she was on the toenails of the conversation. ‘Here he is now,’ she said into the receiver giving him a hateful glare. ‘No, don’t worry, I’ve made up my mind. See you soon.’ She slammed the phone down and ran upstairs. Jack, nonplussed at not being quizzed about his whereabouts, swayed gently for a time at the bottom of the stairwell before following her. She had two holdalls on the bed and she was busy stuffing them with tops and skirts and God knows what from the wardrobe and the drawers. She would need a hundred holdalls, and a truck or two, to carry all the clothes he had bought her. ‘Playtime’s over,’ he slurred and, grabbing her by the arm, dragged her to the bathroom. She clawed wildly at his face, drawing blood, and bit down hard on his fingers with her sharp little teeth. The alcohol in his blood acted as an

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anaesthetic and he shook her until all the fight fell out of her. He began undressing her, tearing the clothes from her body, ripping off her panties with a vicious tug that left an angry red frown across her thighs. She was naked and trembling, ridiculously pink against the blinding white tiles. She tried to cover herself as if he hadn’t seen it all before, as if he was going to rape her. So much for love, honour and obey. ‘Bitch,’ he said, taking the key from the door and locking her in. He went back to the bedroom and gathered up the holdalls and brought them outside to the back garden, making several journeys to clear out all her stuff. He placed them in one big heap by the shed, putting all her shoes at the bottom. Then he lit them, sitting quietly as the flames gradually took hold. ‘Let’s see how far you get with a bare ass,’ he said to her silhouette high up in the bathroom window. A surge of bile raced up his throat. He spent the rest of the night with his head in a flowerpot, shouting at the stars. 3 - FINDING A REPLACEMENT. There were times he regretted hitting her, of course there were, but she needed to be 51

On finding your lover... by Stephen McQuiggan kept in line. He made no excuses for his actions; he wasn’t perfect and neither was she. Perfect women were rare as hen’s teeth. So why was he scared all the time? Like an elephant frightened of a mouse his fear made no sense yet there it was. He was worried constantly now, terrified of nameless, shapeless things. She never protested about the beatings; punishments, he corrected himself. It was not like her not to moan if something upset her. She seemed to know she deserved it. She was sinking further into herself though, until all that was left was a tired looking automaton capable only of cooking and the most basic, mundane conversation; yes dear, no dear. Their sex life was nil. She was so selfish. That was one of the things that really got up his nose. Making love to her was like nailing a corpse, a well built one mind, but a corpse nonetheless. He had finally given up in disgust, but not before he had made her reappraise her numb approach. There were plenty of ladies up on Vine Street that he could spend the housekeeping on for that sort of thing; he didn’t need her for that. She just sat around the house all day, even when the bruises were no longer visible and he allowed her out, 52

scratching herself like a mongrel in front of a fire. When he left for work she’d be at the kitchen table with a Silk Cut in her hand, and by the time he got back she’d still be there, with an empty pack and a full ashtray. Dirty bloody habit. That was another thing that was going to change. She was always bloody pushing him. He felt like he had lost her and it hurt. He had come home to find her in the arms of self pity and he knew he could never win her back from the arms of that whispering lover. He could not remember when he had put her in the attic, not exactly, but it felt like an awfully long time ago. The banging and shouting had stopped days past. Still, it would learn her, change her tune; bet she’s dying to talk to someone now. She would soon learn to appreciate him and be thankful he was the faithful type. He never even flirted with other women, not even Darren’s wife. Once, he had caught her making eyes at the postman, a kid almost. Just once though, he’d seen to that. Maybe he would let her down soon. The alcohol seemed to sweep him along now through the constant blur of days, one bleeding into another. She was awfully quiet up there, but she was a sneaky bitch, you couldn’t trust her.

She’d be a different woman when he let her down and that was exactly what he needed. He would be able to stop drinking then and sort himself out. Hunger pushed her out of his mind. He went to the fridge but all he could find was a pizza and he hadn’t the stomach for it. He found the remains of a half eaten takeaway and decided to reheat that. That was what he had to resort to now, bloody microwave ding dinners. His rage heated up with his curry chip. He sat at the table surveying his meal. It was the sauce bottle that pushed him over the edge. It flew out in one massive dollop, turning his dinner into a red Pompeii. His blood ran molten. He had no-one to shout at so he screamed at the wall where the shards of sauce bottle still hung. Then he turned the storm inward and tore himself asunder.

On finding your lover... by Stephen McQuiggan

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She would pay for this. The step ladder was still beneath the attic hatch. He undid the padlock and slipped the hatch across, raising his head into the darkness. She cowered in the corner, he could see her trembling in the small shaft of light that barged past him into the attic. It smelt bad up here, musky, like an animal lair. He could see that the hem of her nightgown was badly soiled. ‘It’s okay,’ he said. ‘You can come down now and make me my dinner. I’ve got some new rules to go over with you, but once you learn them everything will be okay.’ He heard her snivelling, still playing the pity card, as if that would work with him. ‘Have you got an air bubble in your brain? I said everything would be okay.’ No movement in the shadows, only tears. Issue 19

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‘Don’t make me come up there and get you,’ he warned, but he was already hauling himself through the cramped opening and crawling toward her. As he inched closer she covered her face with her arms to shield herself. He was struck by how scrawny they were, by the bleached iguana skin of her hands. She really had let herself go big time. He grabbed her by the wrists pulling them down a little harder than necessary. Soon things would be back to normal. He had broken her, she was beyond even the pretence of resistance. He let her arms go when he saw the ruin of her face. It was withered, sunken by the weight of a thousand tears. She was so old. Her beautiful strawberry blonde hair was now a hellish white. ‘You’re not my Debbie,’ he

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said, crawling back in disgust. ‘I’m your mother,’ said the old woman in a dry croak. ’Don’t you know me, son?’ His head began to hurt. He shook it violently as if to dislodge the pain. ’Where’s my Debbie?’ ‘She’s gone son. Don’t you remember? She left when you started to…I came to look after you. Please don’t hurt me any more son. You’re not a bad boy, you’re not well, you didn’t mean to…’ He slapped her hard across the face; it felt as cold and clammy as a chicken breast. Trailing her by the ankles he pulled her down through the hatch, then carried her to the kitchen. Oh, she was a crafty one alright, but he wasn’t fooled. He knew Debbie too well not to see through her little tricks. ‘Ah Debs, Debs, Debs. We made it all the way to pleasant and saw the view from nice, didn’t we babe?’ He tied her to the chair. She was going nowhere, he’d see to that. ’Those memories will warm our graves.’ Taking a knife from the drawer he began to slice around her saggy skin, starting on her neck and working upward. He would be able to talk to her properly when he could see her real face.

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Hookers on Archer Avenue Late evening, early morning, I search the night for whores, young and bloody with desires. The night streets are silent streets except for the hookers and the Johns. One wants the pushing of groins the other green eyes in dollar bills are sacred treasures− the snatch of the wallet, a consecrated craft. Both hit the streets quickly satisfy the needs quickly finish in different directions quickly. I’m an old buck now rich with memories more than movement, talking the trash, taking the porn pictures, peeking Tom expert with a naked eye, snooping around department store corners, and dumpy old alleyways. My hair is gray, my teeth eroding, my thoughts leaning toward prayer A.M. Catholic mass, finishing off the early morning with a lethargic walk to pick up my social security check− comforts my needs. Michael Lee Johnson

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The night spoke on The intrusion broke the shell of sleep I looked to locks, was braced ears gorged with every noise The wind upset the neighbourhood dogs old dry leaves scraped dry marble floors the night spoke on, spoke on. I grappled with the ghostâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s thin hide twisted and knotted sought shallow depths of brief respite this futile fight with the hourglass and a fear of death nudging in the darkness I close my eyes and fall Dave Migman

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Girl from Albany Road How is it possible to see what we want and stare until our eyes pop out of our heads? in a Tesco on Albany Road, she struggled with shopping bags her hair all bushy and mad the face of an angel, all plain, lolluppy, bashing into counters, saying sorry to old dears she must be a nurse, or an artist, and a lover of soft animals. I loved her once, for a brief minute, she saw me staring, smiled back I died and bought a single saver return to heaven, just for scenery, just for photographs never asked her out or her name, as she frolicked and glided and bounced on my giant red heart that was touching the ceiling and stopping me speak and was gone but what I want to know is how twenty five years on I still remember the colour of her hair, the pixie-like features, the small frame, the pocket-sized package that stole a certain part of me, a particular inch of me, a chunk of me, a speck of me and became regret personified whole, and put in a cruel place with other itches you can never, ever scratch Dave Lewis

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Golden Harvest You were the last to be chosen, the one nobody cared for; But I saw the sun dissolve to amber gold within your eyes So we took you home, all eager, but oh so unprepared for The depth of love that you would bring to all our lives Your innocence so overwhelming, you frequently amused us Afraid of snow; afraid of shadows and reflections! By and by, slowly, softly, you deemed us worthy of your trust; Accepted us, despite our imperfections Such a harvest we have reaped since we met that bright day; Hours of river walks, of ‘hide-the-toy’ and chase! The years laden with care sustain us now, for they Are still in those gentle, knowing eyes, that much-loved face You have greyed around your muzzle, but are so fair it’s hard to see I have greyed too; my friend, we have grown old together Your bones are stiff when you rise; you are slow to come to me But come to me you do, and still with pleasure This is our Golden harvest then, shared years, bright memories Become content in our devotion, it is true The seasons turn, as seasons will, but we can rest at ease Though summer’s past now and autumn’s days are few What we share remains as new, as fresh, as full and ripe As any bounty weighing down the bough; And when you and I are gone, harvested by time Even then we will love on, as we love now. SP Oldham

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Back from the Moon The winning entry at this year's Swindon Festival of Literature Short Story Competition

Hilda Sheehan

In 1972 my dad came back from the moon...

n 1972 my dad came back from the moon. It was a dull day, cloudy and thick with my mother’s dread. She’d left the curtains closed that morning and didn’t get dressed; didn’t expect us to dress either. It was like that when she was low: all day in her old dressing gown, still as stone, smoking all the time. When the key turned and the sounds of boots thudded on the floor, I ran from the warmth of the gas fire to greet my dad; a cold swash of air entered as I let him in and hugged his legs. He was wearing the clothes he’d left us in early last year, but smelt different; like he’d been packed away in a drawer, not opened for a very long time. ‘Dilly! Look at you! Blimey…what time is it? Not dressed? Bloody hell Ruth, what the fuck’s got into you woman? Don’t you even dress the kids, now?’ Mum glared at him from out of her dark unwashed curtain of hair, took a drag of the cigarette she was smoking before stubbing it out on a saucer full of ash, and left for the 58

kitchen. She shut the door behind her. I could hear the gas ring being lit, the kettle clunking on the hob. ‘Make us a cuppa girl,’ dad shouted. ‘No sugar though …I’ve given up,’ and he put me and Julie on his knee. ‘You are filthy, Dilly, look at your face, porridge, eh?’ He pinched my fat tummy to tickle me and squeeze my extra rolls. ‘A bit too much porridge, I think, Dil, you’re getting a bit of a tub, my little hippo.’ ‘What’s it like on the moon?’ I asked, smoothing his greased black hair and looking into his blue eyes. ‘The moon?’ ‘Mum said you’d gone to the bloody moon, for all she cared.’ ‘Ah … right.’ Dad went quiet, sat back in the chair looking at the closed curtains, the dark day coming in through the cracks. ‘I bet it was exciting… going up like that, into space.’ ‘Well, you know what, it doesn’t really hit you until the last minute or two – I was thinking of here, but all I could see was the other way.’ He hugged

us both close and hard, still looking at the curtains. ‘I missed you girls.’ ‘Did it look like the moon? How you imagined it to be?’ ‘Yep, my moon was pretty much as I had expected…a little rougher than I imagined. It wasn’t exactly paradise or a Sea of Serenity.’ ‘Did you meet some nice friends?’ ‘No, I was the loneliest man in the universe. I felt deserted; it was very strange.’ ‘Did you meet aliens, then?’ Dad laughed. ‘Yeah, I met plenty of bloody weirdos, that’s for sure.’ ‘Did they attack you? Were they green, with five eyes and lots of teeth?’ ‘No, that’s just your mum…Ruth! Where’s the blinking tea, woman?’ I noticed dad had developed a tic. His eyes twitched when he spoke. He looked sad and old and thinner than when he left. ‘Were you sad to go?’ said Julie, spreading her dress out like a big flower. ‘Of course. I had this feeling the whole world was watch-

Back from the Moon by Hilda Sheehan ing me and that the things I’d done wrong would be seen by billions of people. ‘Why do you do things wrong when you go to the moon?’ ‘We that take purses go by the moon,’ said dad, pointing up to the sky, pulling a pained face. ‘So just make sure you don’t end up like me.’ ‘But I’d like to go to the moon, I’m definitely going. One

day.’ ‘No, you’re not. You’re too good for the moon, my love …you’ll be a doctor, or a vet, or something. ‘But I love you, Daddy. I want you to be good.’ ‘I’ve had a lot of time to think and I won’t be going back. It felt like a thousand years up there, Dilly. The life we live is a beautiful thing when you can only imagine it;

like a colored marble out in space. We have to protect that marble in every way that we can. So, it’s my job to make sure you do well in life.’ He put his feet up on the coffee table and sat back in his chair again, closed his eyes. I looked at his big bare feet, wondered if he’d left his prints on the moon, if they were still there, filling up with moon dust.

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The Game

Andrew McIntyre

Then I noticed a pawn blocking my bishop... Check. I had him, my knight attacking his king. My father took a deep breath. Good move son, you’re definitely improving. He pondered the situation, Bishop takes knight, you didn’t see that, did you? You’ve got to be careful of those bishops. We played on, the oil lamp flickering in the damp breeze, the tropical dark seething with unseen things beyond the verandah. The garden was out of bounds at night, recently the gardener killed two cobras near the compost heap uncovering a nest. I watched a lizard stalking a moth across the ceiling. Home from school for the holidays, and I was beating my father at chess. Wait till they heard next term. I saw myself announcing in no uncertain terms, I played my father at chess, and I won. Then I perceived the opening. If only... if only he moved that pawn. He moved the pawn. My queen closed for the kill, the rook supporting, mate in three. Check. He watched me, a faint line of sweat beading his brow, You’ve been playing a lot? I nodded, In the team, Mr. Robinson’s the coach. He 60

grinned, Well, when you see Mr. Robinson next term, you tell him from me that he’s been doing a good job, you hear? Yes dad, I replied. In the meantime, he added, Go fix me a pink gin, will you? The lizard caught the moth, mashing the dusty meal in its jaws. I poured the clear liquid into the glass, breathing juniper. Then tonic, finally a touch of Angostura bitters, the drops exploding like blood. Mixing the contents, looking over my shoulder, I took a sip, then another. With his back to me, focused on the game, my father didn’t notice. I placed the glass in front of him. He looked up, Thank you, son. We resumed play, but the situation had changed. A pawn was blocking my rook. You moved, I said. No, not yet, he replied. But the pawn. What pawn? That pawn wasn’t there before, I insisted. Nonsense, son, you just don’t remember. Frowning, I stared at him. He stared back. The darkness a crescendo of crickets, the occasional screech of a monkey. Knight fork, he said, Watch how the queen works here. It was dan-

gerous, but there was a way out because I had more pieces. For a while I blocked, then came the opening. This might be the end, I said, advancing my bishop across the board, Check. My father started laughing, Good gracious, young man, you could be right, let me think carefully about this one. For a long time no-one spoke. The wind was strengthening, far away a rumbling of thunder. My father looked up. I think there’s going to be a storm. Go and make sure the windows are shut, will you? And tell your mother. I ran through the house closing windows. There’s going to be a storm, I shouted when I saw my mother in the bedroom, Dad told me to tell you. I dashed away before she could reply, because she would tell me to go to bed and I was going to beat my father at chess. Lightning illuminated the sky revealing big puffy clouds the color of mud. Pulsating shadows danced along the walls. I sat down ready to finish the game. Then I noticed a pawn blocking my bishop. You moved again, I said. I most

The Game by Andrew McIntyre certainly did not, replied my father. You did, I know you did, my bishop had you in check, and now there’s a pawn. Look here, young man, I think you’re imagining things. Isn’t it time you went to bed? Outraged, the words spilled out of my mouth, You’re cheating, I know you are, you’re a cheat. Then I realized what I’d said. It wasn’t

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supposed to be like this, and I burst into tears. My mother appeared. What on earth is going on here, she asked, What’s all this dreadful noise? Dad’s cheating, I yelled before my father could say anything, I was winning and he keeps changing the board. Hands on her hips she glowered at him, Is this true? You ought to be

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ashamed of yourself, Peter, she scolded, Teasing the boy, you’re supposed to be teaching him chess. Leaning back in the creaking wicker chair, my father was laughing. Actually, he said, gradually regaining control, Actually, the boy’s teaching me chess, but I’m teaching him life.

Gold Dust

Contributors This issue, we received around 200 submissions, from which we selected our favourite 5% that you can read here. Our contributors sent in their work from the US and the UK.

Short stories Daniel Knibb Daniel Knibb lives in Exeter. He is a proud member of the NHS, working as a dentist for people with special needs, and writes short fiction and poetry in his spare time. In 2010 he published two stories and four poems, as well as being shortlisted for the Exeter Writers’ Short Story Prize. He is also studying for a BA in English Literature. His ambitions include building an earthship, writing a novel and learning to relax. Wayne Dean Richards Wayne Dean-Richards is a teacher, father of three and the author of many pieces of short fiction, published in both the UK and the US. His story Me and Groucho, was published in a previous edition of Gold Dust. He is an accomplished reader of his work, both live and on radio. Some of his short fiction was collected in the critically acclaimed At The Edge, and a novel - Breakpoints - is available from Amazon. See www.waynedeanrichards.com for more details. Henry Little Henry Little is 27 and grew up in Oxford, before studying English & Philosophy at Bristol. He took up writing a year after graduating. Initially completing a first novel, prose led him into poetry, which is now his main focus, though he still enjoys writing short fiction. He is starting a creative writing Masters at Oxford this September. Hayley Sherman Hayley runs a fiction editing and critiquing service (www.whoosh-editing.com), prior to which she worked as a copy-writer for a charity fundraising agency and trained to be an English teacher. She has always been a little squeamish about making attempts to get her own writing published, but adores the format of short stories and is keen to build a solid reputation in this field. Marie Fleurant Marie is 22 years old and was born in France. Artistic to the core, her camera and notebook never leave her. She studied French & English literature in Toulouse before moving to the UK and falling in love with London. Very inspired by the plastic world (especially photography) she tries to produce a writ-

ing that comes as close as possible to a visual and sensory experience. She is currently studying Anthropology at Université Lumière in Lyon. Although she has been writing prose and poetry for 10 years, The Reflection is her first work in English, and the first to be published. Corinna Weyreter Corinna Weyreter was born in Surrey, England. After graduating in astrophysics she spent fifteen years in the oil industry as a petrophysicist, working mostly overseas. She resigned to sail around the world with her boyfriend and her book about their trip, Far Out: Sailing into a Disappearing World, is due to be published this year. She won the 1998 Bridport Prize and has had several short stories published. Stephen McQuiggan Stephen McQuiggan is a factory worker from Northern Ireland who spends the nightshift making up stories in his head, then writing them down in the blurry hours of morning. He currently features in the new anthology from Mirador - Fantasmagoria. Hilda Sheehan Hilda Sheehan's poems have appeared on the BBC website, The Rialto, the National Poetry Society website, The New Writer and South magazines. She has performed her poetry at Bath Literature Festival, Bath Poetry Café, Corsham Poetry Festival and at other poetry events in the South West region. Hilda is the founder of BlueGate Poets, Assistant to Swindon Artswords Literature Development Worker and the MC of BlueGate Poets and Artswords Open Mic in Swindon, and is editor of Domestic Cherry. She is also a mother of five. Andrew McIntyre Originally from Scotland, Andrew McIntyre spent the first six years of his life in South Africa. Educated at boarding school, he attended universities in Britain, Japan, and the US. He holds master’s degrees in Economics and Comparative Literature. Having travelled for much of his life, working at various times as a lecturer, sailor, construction worker, bookseller and pig farmer, he currently resides in San Francisco. Andrew’s stories have appeared in various magazines, while his short story collection, The Short, the Long, and the Tall was published by Merilang in 2010.

Contributors

Poems

2009, a second book of short stories, prose and poetry, Urban Birdsong in May 2010 and is currently writing a novel.

Jeanie Galeazzi Jeannie Galeazzi's work has twice been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and has appeared in forty publications and is forthcoming in Blood Orange, Straitjackets Magazine, and Quality Fiction. Robert Heath Robert Heath is a 41 year old Project Manager from Macclesfield. A former heroin addict, he turned his life around 15 years back and now lives in deeper happiness than he had ever thought possible with his partner and two children. He used to think that the most important thing about writing was being original, but now knows, as with most things, it’s actually being honest, a revelation with no little irony, given his former life. Tanner Tanner has had 300+ poems published in independent literary magazines across the country, has won Purple Patch Magazine Poet of The Year 2007, Erbacce Publishing House Liverpool 08 Poet and has been showcased on The Southbank Centre website. Michael Lee Johnson Michael Lee Johnson is a poet and freelance writer from Itasca, Illinois. His poetry chapbook with pictures, From Which Place the Morning Rises, and his photo version of The Lost American: from Exile to Freedom are available at: http://stores.lulu.com/promomanusa. His previous chapbooks are available at: http://stores.lulu.com/poetryboy. Michael has been published in over 23 countries. He is also editor/publisher of four poetry sites, all open for submission, which can be found at: http://poetryman.mysite.com.

SP Oldham Susan Oldham is 41 years old, married with two sons and aging old friend, her beautiful golden retriever Roman, upon whom this poem is based. She has been writing as a hobby for years now, with various small successes over the years. Her website, Romany’s Ramblings, is at: www.freewebs.com/spoldham. Jennifer Sizeland Jennifer is an English and Creative Writing Graduate and has just finished her MA in Television Documentary Production. Travelling has inspired many of her poems.

Reviews & Features David Gardiner Ageing hippy, former teacher, now part-time psychiatric care worker, living in London with partner Jean and Charlotte the chameleon. Adopted daughter Cherelle lives nearby. Three published works, SIRAT (a science fiction novel), The Rainbow Man and Other Stories (short story collection) and The Other End of the Rainbow (short story collection). Interested in science, philosophy, psychology, scuba diving, alternative lifestyles and communal living, travel, wildlife, cooking and IT. Large, rambling homepage at: www.davidgardiner.net. Claire Tyne Claire lives and works in leafy SW London, after having spent much of her time on coastal adventures in and around the UK. She enjoys reading and writing poetry, philosophising with close friends and strangers alike and enjoying the sunshine. Claire suspects she will be seaward once again, time and seagulls permitting.

Dave Migman Dave Migman is a prolific writer, artist and stone carver. His work has appeared in various online ‘zines and print magazines. These include GUD, Polluto, Identity Theory, Neon, Glasgow Review amongst others. His first novel, The Wolf Stepped Out (a blackly humorous tale of madness and delusion) is available from Dog Horn Publishing.

Vicky Thompson Vicky Thompson is 15 years old. She lives in Dorset and has been writing for the past four years. She spends her spare time writing fan fiction and dancing (she is a Bronze Ballroom and Latin competitive and medallist dancer). She aspires to a career in writing or primary school teaching.

Dave Lewis Dave is from Pontypridd and lectures IT & Photography. He has always lived in Wales, except for a year in Kenya. He has written newspaper columns, sports stories for the BBC, runs several websites and has published poetry in numerous magazines. In 2007 he set up and launched the Welsh Poetry Competition, aimed at discovering new writing talent in Wales. He published his first poetry collection, Layer Cake in March

Omma Velada Omma Velada read languages at London University, followed by an MA in translation at Westminster University. Her short stories and poems have been published in numerous literary journals and anthologies. In 2004 she founded Gold Dust magazine. Her first novel, The Mackerby Scandal (UKA Press, 2004), received critical acclaim. She has also published a short-story anthology, The Republic of Joy (Lulu Press, 2006).

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The Back Page

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Watch this space...

Issue 20 of Gold Dust magazine It may seem like a long way off now, but put a note in your diary that Issue 20 will be out in December, in good time for your Christmas shopping!

Anthologies Our 2 anthologies are available for sale from www.lulu.com/golddustmagazine

Liquid Gold (Lulu Press, December 2010) Anthology of poems ÂŁ6.50

Solid Gold (Lulu Press, January 2010) Anthology of short stories ÂŁ4.50

To submit to Gold Dust magazine Our (short) submission guidelines can be found at: www.golddustmagazine.co.uk/Writers