Tag: poet

What the Dickens, by Julian Isaacs


By Robert Garnham

Angela Merkel, reading Edwin Drood,
Said she liked Durdles the best.
Although she never found how Eddie met his end, And without intending to be rude,
She felt sure Jasper had something on his chest, And was not a faithful friend.
That night in the hookah bar,
It was just like Cabaret.
She played the part of Rosa Budd,
And was certainly a star.
She’d learned all her lines to say,
And looked like Joan Collins in The Stud.
Thus demonstrating that all the world is nothing but a stage,
Whether for Schubert’s Unfinished, Mahler’s 10th, or Edwin Drood performed off the page. That’s the thing about literature and history;
Read all you like — some of it will remain a mystery.

 

Duolingual and becoming 007, by Beth McDonough


By Robert Garnham

Duolingual and becoming 007

Lately, I have become anxious in Spanish.
Sonia. Trust me, I must keep checking.
Does she really have two jobs, this Sonia?
Clearly someone is certain this matters.
That maybe explains why she’s tired every Tuesday.
After all, she can’t even rise in the mornings at 5,
which I’m told my own Abuelo does daily.

How much does she need other work?
I’m assured that her bosses (Amanda y Ana)
are muy simpáticas. Undeniably.
(I can only assume they’re superiors
in job number one. Name her other employers!
Although I can now order up to 39 beers,
that number of jobs seems extreme).

So, I’m worried poor Sonia’s moonlighting,
perhaps as a tasseled pole-dancer, in a club
owned by inexpressibly sinister figures.
That’s confirmed by el jefe’s grey graphic. He’s mean.
What can Fernanda, her much older sister,
be thinking? She’s always annoyed in her big house,
loving three pretty cats and a dog.

But I’m sure El Señor Perez has noticed.
After all, he’s a man with two desks.
What is he jotting with his red bolígrafo?
Surely that can’t be nothing. We know
he is hungry, though yet again he is eating
his favourite cheese sandwich (no ketchup)
with a café con leche. He never drinks wine.

El Señor Gomez is now part of the scene,
wearing his brand new zapatos.
Don’t be fooled by his boleto from Mexico!
He arrived at the estación de tren!
One Señor Castro claims he is a friend!
No-one has mentioned that this one’s Cubano!
Oh, how I fear for you, Sonia.

Then out in WhatsApp, there is Babs.
She tells me nothing of Sonia, but thinks
she’ll just quit this, then ascend some Via Ferrata.
So she’s switched to Italian, to be shocked
that she’s to survive solely on chocolate ice cream,
which she hates. No beers or wine. That won’t help poor Sonia,
as my voice lisps a much slower Sean Connery.

Beth McDonough is adept at spilling cocoa, particularly after winter swimming in the Firth of Tay, or escaping from a bramble bush whilst foraging. She tries hard not to spill on poetry books, including her own fairly recent pamphlet Lamping for pickled fish(published by 4Word). 

 

Wallpaper, by Anne Donnellan


By Robert Garnham

Wallpaper

It was no menial operation nineteen sixty seven
when the decision was taken to paper the kitchen
with walls that climbed to the sky flaking and bruised
a reek-making timber ladder from a the hayshed was used
lugged to the decorating site by a fleet of giddy relations
eager to exhibit their finer skills of smoothing ridges
they attacked the tedious of peeling scraping and filling
made festival of their chalky chore
with whistling lilting and tale spinning

our mother muttered at the makeshift paste bench
fretted over flour and water stirred in thick strictness
relieved when all was prepped to hang the sticky sheets
her elder sister plumbline dangling matched patterned strips
precision scissored like the postman’s moustache
she sponged bubbles and creases without blemish
patted the pink Victorian flora
splashed on velvet red finish

after decades of fading layers
I remember decorators no longer there
stories crawl from wallpaper

Anne Donnellan’s work has been published in the NUIG Ropes Literary Journal 2018 and 2019, A New Ulster, The Linnet’s Wings, Bangor Literary Journal, Boyne Berries, Poethead, Vox Galvia , Clare Champion, Orbis and The Galway Review. She was a featured reader at the March 2019 “Over The Edge: Open Reading” in Galway City Library.

 

Coup de Tea, by Bern Butler


By Robert Garnham

Coup de Tea

I can’t remember when lunch muscled in
shunting dinner, in our house, from one to six,
and spiriting tea away altogether, but recall
it was the same time as kiwis, broccoli,
Telecom Eireann, a flat beige phone in the hall.

No-one missed luncheon-sausage that was
Already dead; rancid slices of blood moon,
or tomatoes, quartered like seasons, falling
backward over lettuce, or salad-cream
blobbed across sulphurous eggs, tinned
salmon, Welsh Rarebit, beetroot from a jar.

Baked beans survived but the toasting-fork
fashioned from a coat hanger was banished
to soot-black tiles at the back of the range
where dour chimney brushes hung
like artefacts from a frightening age.

Corned beef took off to America.
Bananas endured with bunches being
purchased as before but not eaten so much
between slices of bread; more relegated
to the fruit bowl from where they were
abducted, stuffed into Tupperware

to be eaten at school (but only with friends
whose mothers acquiesced with reform)
while we looked down our noses at those girls
who still went home at lunchtime for dinner,
and continued to speak of tea as a meal.

Bern Butler writes poetry and prose. Her work has featured in The Ropes Anthology, TheGalway Review, North West Words, The Blue Nib, Abridged 0-60, The Ireland Chair of Poetry, Ink, Sweat & Tears. She has an MA in Writing from NUI Galway and will be a guest reader at Cuirt Festival Galway New Writing Showcase 2021.

 

able, by beam


By Robert Garnham

able
I wrote into my note app
I ate beans on toast for the millionth time
no exaggeration
I wore pink velvet trousers
I looked at myself and thought ‘’cute’’
I smiled
I fed my dog purina, carrot and peanut butter
but held onto my porkchop
I sang into my computer
I felt like the wheels of my life were moving again
I watched benjamin button become a baby
I felt cold
I wanted to be close again to gone friends
I read kevins book
I was outside
I peed
I used the magic of the internet
I forgot to connect my feelings to the mains of my friends
I warmed up and down
I used my fingers, feet, hands, body
I was able to imagine myself next year
not in a pandemic

‘beam’ is a woman from Galway who is interested in self expression, politics, art and human-beams. Her recent work includes surviving the pandemic and several disappointing sourdough loaves. You can find more of her poetry at @personalbeam on instagram.

 

The Weather says ‘Wake up’, after Dorothy Parker, by Art Ó Súilleabháin


By Robert Garnham

The weather says ‘Wake up’
after Dorothy Parker

You do
nutrients flowing against gravity
through xylem to extremities
from spear to soft
brown to green
cased to unfurled
you are cloaked in a new life
dressed in a spring trousseau
yellow for forsythia
white for blackthorn
pink Japanese Sakura
multi-coloured apple blossom
but what of a late frost in April
We’re here now
We might as well live.

Art Ó Súilleabháin was born in Corr na Móna, Co. Galway and spent some years in Boston USA. He has worked in Dublin, Castlebar and Washington DC before returning to Corr na Móna. He has been featured in Poetry Ireland, Writing Home (Daedalus Press), Hold Open the Door (Ireland Chair of Poetry), Boyne Berries, Skylight 47, Salt on the Coals (Winchester) and Cinnamon Press. He has published books for children as Gaeilge. His first collection of poetry for adults ‘Mayflies in the Heather’ was published by Revival Press in in March 2021. (www.artosuilleabhain.com)

 

Fruit, by Stephen Wren


By Robert Garnham

Fruit

I rub my wrists, being a male lemur,
to produce aldehydes that smell of fruit
they attract mates. I must be a dreamer!
I rub my wrists, being a male lemur,
the smell was designed by the redeemer
He devised bespoke aromas to suit
I rub my wrists, being a male lemur,
to produce aldehydes that smell of fruit

Dr Stephen Paul Wren was educated at Cambridge and worked as a chemist in industry for many years. He transitioned back into academia at Oxford before joining Kingston University in September 2018 where he works as a Senior lecturer.

Stephen’s poetry can be read at www.stephenpaulwren.wixsite.com/luke12poetry and on Twitter @Stephen34343631.

 

A Grudge, by Heather Moulson


By Robert Garnham

A Grudge

On my tenth birthday, I got a toy horse
A party was out of the question of course
But I really wanted a Tiny Tears Doll

Gran got me Playdough, my smile
became thin
I thanked her profusely as it went in
the bin
But I really wanted a Tiny Tears Doll

Was there no end of crap presents today?!
Oh, a construction set! Cheers, auntie Gaye!
But I really wanted a Tiny Tears Doll

Mum baked a cake, the icing was pink
I pigged the lot and was sick in the sink
But I really wanted a Tiny Tears Doll

Heather Moulson has been writing and performing poetry since 2016, and has featured extensively in London and Surrey. Heather’s first pamphlet Bunty, I Miss You! Was published in 2019 She mainly hankers for a certain era and lives in Twickenham with a stroppy black cat.

 

Good Morning Mr Magpie, by Teresa O’Connor


By Robert Garnham

Good Morning Mr Magpie

So how is life in your new job?
It couldn’t be simpler
Your brush stroke always black
Not a hint of light
Only your face calico white

Do you still magnify a molehill?
Huff and puff it into a peak
like the Reek and talk is cheap
And have you climbed it yet?
Oh! and don’t forget your umbrella

And whose ear do you burn now?
You’re a gossip blogger, I hear
Always knew you as a luddite
But then you usually found someone
useful just around the corner

By now you must have genius status
It takes a lot of time to be a genius,
you have to sit around so much
doing nothing, really doing nothing

Teresa O’ Connor-Diskin’s poems have been published or forthcoming in The Galway Review, Skylight 47, Dodging the Rain, Vox Galvia, The Irish Farmers Journal and she was shortlisted for Poems for Patiences 2019.
One of her poems has been added to Poetry in Lockdown collection at the James Joyce Library UCD

 

The Emperor and the Daddy, by Michael Allsopp


By Robert Garnham

The Emperor and the Daddy

I am a Great Emperor attracted by the light of the many Moons and you are a Daddy Long Legs, are you ready to dare enter the court of man, where there are so many rooms.

Whilst I flap and flutter you just rest now on the bottom of the door and when the door is opened, just the tiniest ajar, in we’ll go and muster, dancing in afar.

But, dear Great Emperor this is not a game, these men inside these courts I’ve heard they’re not quite so tame and their children act so beastly, grab my wings, pull off a leg, so I no longer can fly, surely to enter is to be murdered and to die.

Don’t be silly, as Emperor I’ll sit majestically in the corner of a wall, these beasts if to kill me would have to be like seven foot tall. I’ll claim this my castle and my Kingdom if you break-in with me, we won’t become of fate, in fact once inside you might find a loving long legged mate.

Now I’m dancing in excitement at the thought of finding love, so glad that you did tell me, thank you Emperor Moth, I’ll float in through any window for I have such little time and desperate to find a mate and of course it’s dark now and getting rather late.

So, these beasts of these courts, to be greeted by a spindly bug and a buzzing ball of fluff turns them into murderers, sounding sort of huff. The light of their many moons, trance us into a trap, oh no what is happening as I hear a cloth being rapped.

The moth takes off again and again as the beast takes aim, circling at eye level now and seems to have lost rudder control, smacking into the walls in this deathly game. He circles lower and lower, spinning around a moon in tighter revolutions, like a soap sud over an open drain. A few times he seems to touch the light but dances off unhurt but the beast succeeded and reduced him to dirt.

Now I dance and flit and plead don’t kill me I am not full of venom and I cannot bite, I was just attracted by the lure of your lights but I can feel a leg detach and a searing sensation of pain, I was just looking for a mate and now death be my fate.

I dream of flower beds and grasslands and wooded coppice, free with all the wildlife and pretty flowers and trees. But here I am dying inside this court of man, slain a slow death as I dream of flying across the Great Gromboolian Plain.