PublishED is a University of Edinburgh student society that produces the semesterly publication ‘The Inkwell’, aimed at showcasing the literary and creative talents of our students. We encourage and offer exposure to budding novelists, poets, dramatists, artists and photographers. PublishED itself brings together a community of aspiring young writers, editors and publishers. Our regular meetings alternate between talks by guest speakers from the writing and publishing industry, Open Mic nights and creative writing workshops. We help to provide information and advice on how the book world works and how to work in it. president
Silje Graffer
secretary
Emily Gowers
treasurer events
& social
Ariel Lerner Imogen Ashfield Sarah-Jane Dale
editor in chief
Figgy Guyver
head of design
Julia Barbour
general editor
James Gao Alison MacDonald
poetry editor prose editor drama editor copy editor
Reyyan Özer Rebecca Raeburn Jessica Harris Khanya Mtshali
Editor’s Note
Pentagons, a boy band, the worst channel on terrestrial TV, half way to double-digits, secular stars, Julian, Dick, Anne, George, (Timmy). Welcome to FIVE, issue xi of The Inkwell. What were you doing five years ago? PublishED and The Inkwell were celebrating the end of their first year as an official university society. This issue is here to celebrate (happy birthday to me, happy birthday to me). We’re proud of how far this society has come since it first started. Within this broadest of themes you will find everything from (5) movie-inspired haikus, to apocalyptic reports of the 5th July. There are waves and wounds, misogynists and misanthropes. Find a quiet corner somewhere, and have a flick through or a slow meander across the pieces contained in the following pages. Figgy
publishedinburgh.blogspot.co.uk publishedinburgh@gmail.com @publishedsoc
City of Waves In the city of a billion waves we harvest for the future. Office blocks blossom from the violent foam. We are coping, and we know things: clouds, machines, how to hijack oceans for ourselves. Do not mention time. Each citizen must love another citizen. We know our children scrutinise the Milky Way, and weep. A severed moon engraves the surf. This is insanity. These are insane waves.
Dom Hale
July the 5th There is a place in the city where nobody can live, and nothing can grow. Although this borough connects to the Downtown, the Midtown, the north, south, and Orange town, to the industrial heart of the city, it is, itself, the city’s industrial arteries. It pumps people, like platelets, or lumpy hockey pucks. The people are siphoned out from the suburbs, where they are organized in grid and sub-gridlet. They are drawn, also, from glassy wheat fields that kiss the smooth, even coating of city-satin, laid in one struck, through which highway runs like painter’s tape between it. Pumped suburb to city, back again, like a palindrome, again back, city to suburb, pumped. To the west: a tongue of road wider than a football pitch and straight enough to beat the flying crow bears sliding lives down the saw into the city before seeing back, in the evening, away form the Mississippi. To the north: the highway arches on-elbow like a lounging statue to avoid, lying beside it, a national park. To the east: it goes away from the city. This is the direction we came from on the day after the fireworks because the air was calm. Also, the aim of the sun was graceful and true on a window that told me, through dusty finger smudges, “I love my city.” Also, there was nothing to do. We came from that direction because it was the direction of tomorrow, and we wanted to return to today to do something different, and insure we weren’t repeating yesterday. We road bikes on a fourth highway meant for human-powered vehicles, and we approached the road-hive – the patch upon which the downtown west and bourbon colored east could rest assurance of relations. We left the park path and biked first past a prison, and then past people’s houses. Some people were inside, complaining about how hot it was, but others were in their backyards, grilling barbeque. Others more were listening to hip-hop, and laughing very freely.
Maybe this made it so much easier for the breeze to carry to us, wrapped in tenderloin, and lingering gunpowder, their laughter. We couldn’t see anyone, because the hedge of trees was higher than their yards, so under the sounds and smells we could feel very safe, and underground. In the center of the road-nest, which by now was many stories above our heads, the cavernous groan from roaring cars was serene, and the shadow of the road cooled sweat into calm. It was like a grotto, I thought – perhaps a colossal, breathing place, lounging, yawning, and soaking up the malaise of a day… In the center of the road-nest a pole grew that was a smooth trunk that dwarfed the national park and dwarfed even the cars. It was more than a car length, it was two bus lengths, and it did not grow from a seed, either. The trunk was carried in pieces on the bed of a truck. Yes, it was backwards. On top of the pole, in full view of passing cars and hot-air balloons, a vinyl image of a woman holding a baby was stretched taut across a frame. Anybody could see it quite clearly, which was the point, and next to the woman was the phrase: “Can free healthcare really ensure our children’s safety?” The billboard often bore slogans like these, which probably often had many drivers scratching their heads and seriously considering the notion. Some drivers, swilling coffee from an aluminum tumbler, may not give it any thought at all. They could either disagree or agree entirely without argument, and these were probably the target platelets for such a campaign. We stashed our bikes and briefly talked to each other about how we would cut the woman’s face out of the canvas. Her face was one of intense concern, and passion. Surely the photographer was very clear about how passionate and concerned the woman must try and look. We brought garden sheers for the deed, and we stood beneath the trunk of the billboard, watching its inanimate husk interact with the steady whoooosh of traffic. The climbing of the trunk would be systematic, and without thought. We decided it would be best not to think, because it would keep our palm moistening mind-wanderings at bay during the climb of the vertical highway. To the sky: this highway will work against you to remain on top. It was a route one could “trust”.
It took us two steady minutes to reach the halfway platform. We felt very exposed at that height. Nobody was on the bike path today for us to watch. We had discussed earlier the possibility of people watching from the halfway tower, but all we could do is stand cramped together on a shaky metal palette that creaked “anti-cliiiiimax.” We watched nobody for what felt like an hour. Most of the day had been feelings of hours passing, without ever actually greeting the hour as it came. We talked about how tomorrow, when the advertisement is faceless and the worker bees are working, we will have passed into the public conscious like an hour – unnoticed. We began to climb again, and also imagine what the drivers would think of us, scaling the access ladder to a billboard, a peripheral form of architecture human’s weren’t supposed to associate with. It was funny to imagine them not noticing us as well, or the horrific billboard, which was gradually growing larger and more grotesque as we climbed. It was funnier to imagine them staring at their cellphones, or applying makeup, or wrestling a thick-spined paperback. Right before reaching the top, I shared a private thought with myself about how the rest of the day would go. I thought about how, after cutting out the face, we would have to decide how to carry it down. Maybe we would toss it, whimsically. It might sink like a stack of pancakes onto a perfectly round cut of glazed porcelain. It might drift away on the wind though, floating above the motorists like a manta ray, settling in the canopy of some faraway cord. I thought about how much thought would have gone into producing a billboard for thoughtless people, and how would take so little for us to fuck it all up, and how little thoughts here and there would catch a wind and about face in the Delta’s tide of circumstance, and nobody would learn anything, and the billboard would be replaced, and tomorrow, like yesterday, would be very much like today. Ross Devlin
Apples and Honey
L’Shanah Tovah “To A Sweet New Year!” or so they say find meaning, the mean truth drowning in matzo ball soup— add salt to the bowl, the wounds, the empty chair beside-me phantom limb unwanted guest while elijah looms (behind locked doors) apple wedges: smiles frown passed around and around and around the table— vertigo, sweet sweet honey
devash
dr ips
dr op le ts into the dish. filling thick fluid not the void count raisins in my the way i saw Him last: raisins in the sun
challah
“Shalom!” hello, peace, goodbye? last year i wasn’t there should have been there should have been there
shut up and drink my whine like a good jew
boray pri ha’gafen a toast “to life, to life
l’chayim!” Jennifer Greenberg
It Takes Poppies once grew, I saw them,
and naked, the room was still,
Their damp skins pressed the window
Our family, newly hewn,
And I was afraid to touch
Black bruises bloom, pale dents, it
Their sharp down,
is my extraction, my duplicate
The tight drooling cleavage
Kin, my
I watch it foam, disgusted
Static sister, I redrew her,
The imagined human tongue
She chews the soft insides of
Imagine
Inverted dandelions
But should I have guessed that
The milky stems
Red flowers spat? I didn’t.
Her clammy hands touch the window My sister told me, The doctors burned
Their crumpled floury heads tap
My mother, they used a hot
the window, the absence of
Poker, my sister told me;
arm, or foot or finger, and
When you marry you inflate
Trick tree
You split
shadows agitate the
Spit in the fire, bubbling like cheese,
warm sunlit square where I stared,
Has your mum had the baby yet?
The momentary weight of,
Not for a long time, yet, it takes
windows shake, Someone undressed the couch
Natalie McKinnon
Lucky Lady I knocked back my G&T, and gestured to the bartender for another. He poured a new glass and squeezed my preferred three limes into the liquid. Half a bottle of Bombay gone, it had been a long day. I took this one slower, knowing I was at that fine stage of drunk which people find attractive: the stage where I’m confident, witty and funny, all rolled into one. Pulling my sleeve across my lips to wipe away some of the drink which hadn’t quite made it to my mouth, I cast a prowling look around the bar: hunting. Steadying myself on the bar stool, I focused on each woman, one at a time. Two blondes, a redhead, three brunettes – all shifting in their seats, uncomfortable under my stare. I didn’t blame them; I’d be intimidated too. I took my comb from my jacket pocket and ran it through my slicked back hair, making sure it was well oiled in place, so shiny the light reflected across it in an absolutely stunning manner. I finished the drink. I felt a trickle of liquid run down my chin, having escaped my bush of a moustache. This moustache had caught many ladies in it, and tonight would be no different. I ran my fingers along its gentle curve, making sure the tips were waxed into spectacular curls. The process of ordering another G&T was a little more tricky this time, since my glass had suddenly smashed on to the bar floor. I quickly put the blame on the bartender, who had clearly knocked it over when I gestured for a new one. “Careful now sir, remember your manners. They cost nothing you know,” was the reply I got for my accusation. “Oh fuck aff, and gimme another before I git yir manager over here.” But he’d already moved off, apparently out of earshot, although I knew he could still hear me. Bastard was just ignoring me, casually polishing glasses and thinking he was God’s gift to mankind. Just as well the drinking part of the evening was over, otherwise I would’ve really given him something to think about. But the clock was ticking closer to closing time: now it was time to find me a lady. The blond closest to me looked like she knew a thing or two; perfect.
I got down from my stool and might have staggered just a little. Steadying myself on the bar, I stared at the blonde, letting my intentions known. My eyes were piercing and seductive; she would not be able to resist. The stool moved out from under my hand and I slipped a little, but I managed to regain my composure fairly quickly. Another stool behind me was knocked to the ground, but I could only assume some twat had kicked it over by accident. I didn’t bother turning round to check, as breaking the gaze I had on the blond woman would show weakness. And I was not weak; I was powerful and masculine. But I had waited just a moment too long, because before I knew it the woman and her friend had their coats on and were out the door: she had even left half her drink unfinished. She glanced back from the doorway, her eyes telling me she just didn’t think she was good enough, and that I deserved better. That quiet language of seduction had spoken too strongly; I had intimidated her with my rough carnality. Or maybe she was playing a game, wanting me to chase after her? Well, I wasn’t going to do that. There were plenty more women for me in the room. “Clearly a woman who lacks taste in fine gentlemen. I would bet every woman in here is simply dying to be ogled at like that.” So the bartender was back and had changed his tune. Obviously he’d been regarding my sultry techniques and had been rightly impressed. “Aye yir right there. Probably goin’ out tae meet some wee laddie. Pah! She needs a real man. But hur loss, eh?” “Quite,” replied the bartender. “She wis a bit prim anyways. Bet there’s way filthier burds in this joint.” “Indeed,” intoned the bartender. I furtively looked across the bar to meet his eyes, suddenly suspicious of his mockery. “Aye, fuck aff ya wee cunt. You dinnieh ken a hing”. With a shrug of his shoulders and a final warning about my general conduct, the bartender sauntered back to the opposite end of the bar where he continued shining his glassware.
Head in the game: who would be the next lucky creature to fall for my charm? Maybe some music would help soften the ladies, show them my sensitive side. I made my way toward the jukebox, almost slipping on a stray lime that had escaped to the floor. A group of young men sitting a few tables to my left were watching me. I towered above them, fuelled with masculinity and a remarkable jawline. Still, I smiled at them, not wanting the atmosphere in the bar to become strained; I needed everyone at ease for my game to run smoothly. Sadly, it seemed I could only raise half my lips into a smile, as it appeared my moustache had become a little too gin-logged on the right hand side. I imagined this unique smile gave me a certain mysterious quality, and the young men clearly agreed. They turned their backs to me, shaking their heads in wonder at my cool confidence. My toe banged against the jukebox, the sharp pain bringing my head back to the moment. The machine in front of me was overlaid with buttons, too many for any man to comprehend. Nonetheless, I steadied my vision and focused on the names of the artists I could choose from. I found the perfect album immediately. Barry White’s greatest hits began to leak from the speakers. The perfect combination of sexy and playful. That’s right, ladies. Tonight could be your night. Beth Cochrane
5 haikus for the top 5 films on IMDB (I’ve counted both parts of The Godfather as one because I felt that 12 Angry Men deserved a haiku) Shawshank Redemption
12 Angry Men
The gun’s in the lake
Can we please go home?
No it ain’t, off to jail son
We at least getting Chinese?
Dig, dig, dig, dig, FREE
Fuck, fine, not guilty.
The Godfather: Part 1
The Godfather: Part 2
Good morning honey…
Hide my guns Vito
Fuck that’s a severed horse head!
Don’t touch Fredo til Mom dies…
Where has my wife gone?
Now take him fishing
The Dark Knight (to be read in the voice of Christian Bale’s Batman) I fancy Rachel Fuck, I’ve saved Harvey instead Don’t get a mirror
Pulp Fiction I want that trophy It was a… BRING OUT THE GIMP! Sshhh, the gimp’s sleeping
Chris Savage
…and may chaos reign supreme White ceramic plates, white linen, white marble table. A single scented candle burned, wafting the acrid smell of lavender across the living room, continuing down the corridor where it clashed and gave battle to the smell of roasted lamb and figs, cooked for six. ‘Tap…Tap…Tap’ A single finger drummed the edge of one of the plates, leaving a faint fingerprint on the rim, fading then reappearing, fading then reappearing every time the middle finger struck. “Michael!” The finger stopped its barrage and waited, listening for the voice it knew would call again. The finger shook for a moment, the weight of the mangled hand it held up pressing down upon it. “Michael!” She entered. “Michael please, they’re all coming in ten minutes… Christ you’re not even in your shirt yet.” He sat there, unmoving, dull eyes staring at the pristine cutlery laid out on the table, five knives, five spoons, six forks. A single bead of sweat trickled from behind his ear making its way down his neck before settling in the crevice between shoulder and string-vest. She, as usual, seemed cool, collected, her evening attire already in place; white shoes, white dress, white teeth, sharp as razors. “I put that blue shirt you like out it’s on the bed. Just run up now and throw it on. Seriously Michael, ten minutes, you don’t want to look like… look just go throw it on, that’s all I ask.” With a grunt, he pushed himself up out of the chair, left hand pressed against the table, right hand hanging pathetically by his side. He did not acknowledge Her as he brushed past on the way to the bedroom, his eyes darting this way and that, looking everywhere but Her. The stairs creaked as he climbed them. At the final stair he stopped, waited
for a moment, then began to walk backwards down the way he came. There it was again, the creak, fourth and fifth step. She’ll have it fixed at some point. Suffocate it. Pictures. Pictures lined the walls of the bedroom, memory upon memory packaged and displayed for eternity, wooden block frames, painted. No glass in the frames anymore. Two faces stared back from every picture. She, with that smile attached in every photo, a mask worn for every occasion. Another face, it was unfamiliar. Now lost, now forgotten. The bedside draw was locked. A metallic thud could be heard against the wood as he rattled it. The key had been hidden from him a long time ago. Trying again, he curled the lone finger of his right hand round the handle, the loose decrepit joints ached and stung as he did so, and placed his left hand on the side of the draw to steady it. He yanked his hardest, desperation seeping from him like the sweat that continued to drip down his haggard face, but to no avail the draw stayed shut. “Bitch!” Michael lashed out at the chest with his foot, big toe catching the sharp wooden ridge. A gasp escaped him as he and the bedside lamp that had sat atop the draw crumpled to the floor. “Michael! What was that noise?” The lamp had smashed upon impact, shards of glass and pottery scattered on the bedroom floor. He sat there breathing heavily, tears of frustration now mixed in with the clammy sheen of sweat. ‘Tap… Tap… Tap’ Something was dripping. Michael sat there unmoving for a moment, listening to the sound, to the continuous melody of warm blood seeping onto a Kashan wool carpet. He could hear it seeping into the fabric, see it worming its way down through to the very seams, feel it corrupting the design, Her perfect design. ‘Tap… Tap… Tap’ Michael shot straight up. No longer aware of the pain in his foot, or the aches in his hand, there was fire in his eyes. As he passed through the dining room he paused for a moment, surveying this charade of civility, soon, soon. He reached out and seized the bread knife that had been set out on the table
alongside a brown loaf and a saucer of olive oil and vinegar; he didn’t have much time. The Kitchen was humid, the air thick with the aroma of roast meat. The extractor fan blared, drowning out his footsteps as he entered, She did not hear him, and she did not look up. Her back was turned and he could make out the smooth curl of her neck, the regal ridges of her shoulder bones that extended out over the incline of her cream white dress. He could make out the methodical chop of vegetables being sliced against a chopping board, saw her slender arm rise and fall with the noise. He raised the knife... And she turned. The knife fell to the floor with a clatter. Still avoiding her eye contact he crouched, nervously, hesitantly reaching for the wooden pommel of the weapon. She’d begun to walk towards him now, the slow pronounced walk of a predator who knows they have their kill cornered. She was standing over him now, and he was shaking, shaking out of fear. Out of anger, out of confusion. She placed her hand on his shoulder and he almost screamed out loud, a whimper emitting between pursed lips. She seemed to pull him up with the lightest grip of her hand and now they were facing each other, she held his face in her hand, index finger and thumb placed lightly on his chin. I’ll always love you Michael” The doorbell rang; she released her grip on his face and sauntered out of the kitchen. He’d missed his chance, he’d failed; he knew what he had to do. The doorbell rang again as he crossed the kitchen to the chopping board where She had just stood; red pepper and tomatoes scattered. He placed the finger on the board, and for a moment stared at the stumps that surrounded it. What’d once been his little finger seemed relatively presentable in comparison with the gashed ex-index finger, the wound only a year old. He took a breath, a gasping breath and as he closed his eyes he saw the light catch the knife’s edge as it made its way down towards the soft, worthless flesh. The door opened. “Happy anniversary!” Ethan Ennals
Broken Equations, 2 + 2 = 5 Ifya boyfriend don’t like it, id’a date, But he don’t godda know, tho, I mean, we can do this low, no? Forgo high stakes, earthquakes and shifting plates. Amin, u ganna go? No wave, as it sails away? No way. Idi it, nah – idiot. I’m not worth that shit. Trust, fuck love. Fuck it! Please, Tell me I don’t need it. Two scoops of sorbet, And a cerveza, camarero, He finna, no dinner, Climbing trees, throwing stones Throu the winna, Sees you on your throne, You the crown, me the sinner, Too much rhymes, when you feel like death, But to a woozy rhythm, opaque with autism; Your dying can’t find The peace it needs To slip away unseen, Its gravestone, unmarked, clean,
And the devil’s bedroom door is open, Tempting you with that potion, It gives sweet release, until the pain is awoken, Agen, leaving the chain unbroken. I used to be a house, a home, Now the temple’s derelict; the lights won’t glow, The chipped ceramic flo’, the torn linoleum, Once trod on by holy-men; You can try to fill the rooms agen, The shrines, the turrets, the walled g’den, But who knows, rent’s expensive In this brooding tower, its iconic lour, A dilapidating halcyon with fungal robes, If you can’t afford it, you’ll have to go.
Jamie Delves
Sexualised, commodified, everything but legalised Š Alice Miekle
Hosts i saw you give up the ghost adventurous spirit dimmed to fade can i climb inside and breath fire on your lungs you know i will smoke filled ashen breaths let lava pour from tongues allow my licks of flame alight the scorched earth host of the air host of the sea take bread and wine and commune with me confess make room in barren pastures break me lift your hand bless me breathe into my spirit regain ghostly vapours in your throat inhale, let me in Eloise Hendy
De Temporum Fine Comoedia a play of morals in one act with an interlude
Dramatis Personae Archbishop Torquemada prominent Spanish Christian Joseph Stalin prominent Russian Atheist Osama Bin Laden prominent Saudi Muslim a crowd of 16th century Japanese Buddhists
prominent Japanese Buddhists
the Meaning of Life evasive as always Nietzsche, Kant, Wittgenstein
random Germans
Marquis de Sade Choir of High School Atheists Other Christians, Muslims, Atheists, Buddhists etc.
Praelusio ENTER Choir of High School Atheists (exclusively male. School uniforms, acne, braces) Choir of High School Atheists sing to the traditional hymn meloldy: Glory to Dawkins, and praise and love Be ever, ever given, By products of evolution below and products of evolution above, Organisms on earth and heaven.
On this glad day the glorious Sun Of Rationality arose; On my benighted mind He shone And filled it with repose.
Leader of the Choir:
Oh brothers in the glorious atheism! How glad I am that we were so happy as to free ourselves from the constrains of religious superstition! How stupid, how devoid of reason and ability to think for themselves one has to be in order to believe in those Mediaeval fairy tales!
ENTER St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Augustine of Hippo, Descartes, Pascal, Leibniz, Kierkegaard, Chesterton, Anscombe St. Thomas, Augustine and the rest clear throat: Ekhem
Choir of High School Atheists realise how intellectually inferior they are to most of scholars of religion (Christian or Atheist), given they haven’t even completed their A-levels, and also that the truth or falsehood of a doctrine isn’t determined by the ratio of stupid to intelligent people who subscribe to said doctrine Choir of High School Atheists: Let’s go and do what awkward high school teens do best (Walk off the stage to masturbate, each in their own room) EXIT Choir of High School Atheists EXIT St. Thomas, St. Augustine and the rest (leaving on the stage an impressive pile of philosophical papers and books they’ve written that would take a couple of years to thoroughly study) Scene the FIRST ENTER Torquemada, Stalin, bin Laden, Japanese Buddhists
Torquemada kills some Jews in the name of Christianity Stalin kills some Christians in the name of Atheism
Meaning of Life eludes comprehension bin Laden kills some Americans in the name of Islam Crowd of 16th Century Japanese Zen Buddhists kill some Catholic missionaries in the name of Buddhism a Humorous Interlude
or, An offensive play on the difference between Germans and the French Nietzsche: Wish I wasn’t a virgin Kant: Wish I wasn’t a virgin Wittgenstein: Wish I had sex with more than, like, two people in my life (side note: exact number a topic of historical debate) ENTER Marquis de Sade riding on a chariot drawn by a swarm of hot, naked teens of both genders de Sade:
Peasants...
End of Humorous Interlude and beginning of Scene the SECOND
Saint Maximilian Kolbe looks disappointed at Torquemada while saving the life of a fellow Auschwitz inmate by sacrificing his own Bill Gates looks disappointed at Stalin while introducing advanced medical care programmes to Africa Malcolm X looks disappointed at Bin Laden while fighting for racial equality in the United States Dalai Lama looks disappointed at murderous 16th century Buddhists while coming up with uplifting quotes and generally acting awesome Meaning of Life still evades comprehension (what a dick) ENTER Choir of Angels (with trumpets, flaming swords, chariots of dawns, wings of thunder and the like equipment)
Choir of Angels sings to the trumpet music: Apparebit repentina Dies magna Domini Fur obscura velut nocte Improvis occupans Torquemada: Bin Laden: Stalin: Buddhists:
Aw, shit, man. shit shit shit
Choir of Angels drags Torquemada and his party to Hell and proceeds to take St. Maximilian, Bill Gates and the rest to Heaven the Moral of the story sings and step-dances in a burlesquian manner:
Oh dear oh dear oh dear the end of play is near let me state this to you clear Here’s the thing you came to hear:
Any idea, religious or not, can be (mis)used to do evil, and hell and murder has been brought about; by ideas most civil,
An honest man will never think an ideology bad as a whole; Or consider it a false thing Because it was an excuse for some asshole
La fin Przemysław Kamiński
Death to the West violence we have long abhorred my friends squirming between antique towers where we spent our mutual childhood yeah we have abhorred violence we have known a thousand cities aching with icons and sounds we have known money credit deft passages of time friends you and I have seen the office workers have seen the happy employees who worked long and short hours who were the friends of satisfactory products and we have well-observed the sky ricked gaudy over Gaza and Saigon planes or eyeless drones spraining packed squares and plazas we who befriended machines and the language of machines and who are concerned with elegies and the production of elegies to sate our own guilt elegies directing the horizon tower upon tower the graceful monoliths is this a bit too much or what
friends you and I who masturbated long into the night over images of wreckage decked out for us on screens we who regulated charts and graphs and reels of statistics who monitored websites at the hour of atrocity counted hit rates while bodies flocked in mounds I don’t mean to hector us I know I’m being finicky the suburbs were my first friends and my last friends we who the papers and corporations made insane who developed floorplans for supermarkets and grew fat in front of screens who saw the distant stars and thought only of ourselves we at the zenith of abuse come quietly my friends Dom Hale
The Sicksong of Old Betty Grant Going in a spasm the width of the white wallsThat cut you planted last week, Mrs Grant, has it blossomed into a scab? She has baked it with an iron, a pink puff pastry. Ohh I had a welt but it wilted, tra-la had a wound butfuck god knows where the thing has got to, cowering in an arm pit? Afraid to bleed! Ohh the nurses they won’t let me bee-e-ee, they are always adjusting my knee-e-ee, always p-prying with the white florescence in me myth ic places caves joints cavernous the inner ear (“Stand up, my dear”) pricking and prying with awful unnature applying all the godlorn day tenderly a glove to a hand, cream in the patches, needle to fistula, twice a week a cross-section spread green all open, screaming all night fooor her tendon it is sore
But clever me i nurtured in the warm damp confines of me ladyship (oh secret amethyst-ruby arrabesque!, ooh me Arrrabian pleasure garden ) several purplish pustules they have not discovered. Fred Spoliar
Cleaning Š Valeria del Castillo
For Noel You turned up floating, boasting through fetid breath how it all went down. I regret I didn’t see the blood dripping past your cuff, but that upper lip was wobbly and wetted, seeking relief, drowned in Smirnoff. Her mind was adrift and you needed an ocean to sail to save her from the swirl but that old sea swell sank your ship. Sprawled out in the bathroom for three hours, I helped you up the stairs, but never thought to look beyond the anecdotal as you curled up in the spread of my blue bed sheets. I was tired and I sent you home up the path well trodden, through the sleet and into the eye of the storm. Years on, the winds have changed and maelstrom now looms towards your neighbour’s port. Once more I want to see a bed vacated. Not this sable outline sedated in a duvet, loose nightgown draped over lolling tits. I ask about it often and as her eyes roll to find mine I tell her not to sit up. My father comes in with tea and they huddle in calm hope and melancholy while I make my way to the green to smoke trees. I look back and I see you. Nat Bury
On Wordy Leftovers Today’s spirits lengthen in noise like Eyelids closed over a hooked nose. It is Blackness that performs poetry. It cools Clocks that prefer racing to remembering And tends to the swallows of invincible-self That in last night’s frozen verbs remained. The sky has been bluer Today than its bluest ever. Evelyn Zake
Coming Down the Pike
When you were five and I the next day it was Inseparable they called Us. You Two was shouted and all knew which two was meant. Us two. Consecutive weekends at respective houses in play rotation. Week one a paper bag of chemically sweetened eggs/hearts/footballs/bears up to a heptagonal value and swimming once you learn. Week two brings short film stardom/focaccia/ big brothers/sheep shit fields. Sometimes simultaneous. The former and latter book-ending five days of school together for the duration of primary. You’re like brother and sister or you’re going to get married. K.I.S.S.I.N.G. Those are the only two afforded Us. My blood or my boyfriend. Choose. Seven years of we’re only friends and then a few more. Then there’s You and Me. No us but Them. A tenuous link to the we there once was. It is all change when I am fourteen and You are too. Fourteen is not the same. Now I talk to girls. And boys. Sometimes. Boys who hold hands with me or who tell a friend to tell a friend to me that do you want to go out with Douglas? I talk to girls and boys and You kick footballs and don’t talk to much. Our limited interactions through the group. We is safe in numbers. We exists among the mass. In a troupe of five plus mixed company. Because platonic exists in neither concept or vocabulary when a we are fourteen. So We must wait. But fourteen is not the pinnacle of obligatory avoidance. This appears to occur two years later when who’s snogging who becomes a little bit more and the party is re-invented so we think. Sixteen is dangerous for Us. So We waits. At eighteen They can still call us inseparable though they don’t. It is a geographical closeness at its foundations and indeterminate levels of block work above. Fifteen years of shared teachers/classes/queues/football practice and now a shared choice of city and of higher education. So We waits. You/Me/Him. The minimum group and it is He who initiates. You want to come round? He is coming. You want to go out? She is coming. And we do go round and out together with Him as the necessary intermediate. Always
to His. Three stop journey; You to mine/Me to You/us to His. The transitional time of one to one fuelled by work/halls/food/home/telly/football/new mates chat. Comfortable if shallow ground. A continuity arises. He is that element with whom we can be alone or together but never close. He is the obligatory moderator. He is the remainder of the group and He is why We is waiting. And now it is happening. Not that but the worst possible. Mine will be gone soon and so far away. This is not group appropriate subject matter even given that He is all that defines it so. For Me Us is needed. Who else? But We is no longer a concept recognisable as an individual. It is an amalgamation of the whole and one difficult to separate. It must be done. Through phone that does not speak. Written word. Can we talk? I’ve had a terrible day dad-wise. Immediate response. Relative to Your usual no signal excuse of a reply. Within minutes You are outside but not in. Away seems an appropriate place for this. Away from Him is a recent first and away from new Thems. No way to explain without the childhood response. Do you like him? We must wait for them. Or never acknowledge. We walk down the street/through the park/sit on swings. Quietly appropriate nowhere. Attempts to maintain the nothingness of our developed conversations fade quickly. This is beyond. What is comfortable and what is safe for Me and You. A new form of the oldest not ready to be spoken. Difficult clearly yet somehow flooding. There is no group who know so none to wait from. No direct contact. No hugs/hands/squeezes/strokes as may seem correct to Them. Not to Us. Words of meaning for the first in a long time. That are listened and remembered. That help then stop. Silence that works for Us. That was so feared by Me and You but functions for the one/two/three/four/five steps back to the door. Then. We should do this again some time from You. Yeah. We really should. And now I am waiting. Ruth Hamilton
Love Poem to an Apartment i. I remember when we used to drink Until our bellies burned Like brass lamps. I was young and terrified Of how I didn’t look my age. I grasped at your hands Like a tree trunk, to keep From blowing away. ii. When there are five pairs of arms Waiting to catch you, You suddenly become brave; Running in front of trains, Breaking into abandoned buildings, Changing your name. We stole a traffic cone once, For no good reason Other than to point and say “We went where we were not Supposed to go, and we survived.” iii. I am bad at falling in love, But I sleep so soundly On your couch, in the small Niche you have carved for me Into the stonework of your lives. You saw a wild thing in me, And instead of trying to tame it, You set out a saucer And a place by the fire. Elizabeth Burton
But Why Hair, Why Are You Everywhere? Š Eleanor Jones
For 2015-16, the Department of English Literature is offering three exciting opportunities for writers who wish to explore their talents, foster their craft, and learn about publication. All programmes are taught by experienced teachers who are also well published writers. MSc in Creative Writing This one-year, full-time taught MSc offers students the opportunity to focus in depth on their own practice - of poetry or fiction - and develop both creative and critical skills through a combination of weekly workshops and seminars. MSc in Creative Writing by Distance Learning This three year, part-time course enables students to focus in depth on their own practice from home. It offers tutor and peer support and provides a clear framework with which to monitor development. It aims to develop awareness of process, to further craft and to raise writing and editing skills to the highest possible level. MSc in Playwriting This is a unique practical playwriting course and will appeal to aspiring playwrights, performance artists, directors, dramaturges and critics alike. Taught through seminars, writers’ workshops and practical workshops with actors, directors and other theatre professionals, it will focus not only on the craft of writing for performance but also on how a script plays out in real space and time, and in front of an audience. For more information about these and other MSc programmes in English Literature visit: www.ed.ac.uk/schools-departments/literatures-languagescultures/english-literature/postgraduate/taught-masters