This month’s poem is inspired by both a trip during August to Northern Ireland, my journey of DNA discovery, and the depressing news cycle we watched when we (rarely) turned on the TV to catch the news while taking in the magnificent Causeway coast. I recently had my DNA ancestry traced on 23andMe and discovered that […]
We lived on a road at the base of the massive outcrop in the picture above which is, of course, Cave Hill. Straddling the skyline of North Belfast, it was immortalised by Jonathan Swift as a Sleeping Giant. The best panoramic views of the city and Belfast lough are from the peak by McArt’s Fort, or […]
Philomena Who’s in that house there, look? I thought I saw a light flickering in the empty rooms; who’d be in there late on Saturday night? Who’s in that house there – that wee house belongs to my dad! No one lives there now. Should we go and check it’s nothing bad? Who’s in that […]
The Customers Finally, summer’s here, and we’re enjoying a wee drink in this bar. A mix of us, from both sides of the fence. Unusual for these troubled times but it works for us. The balmy moon glows in our glasses, when the yellow headed men invade the bar and call out for us to separate by faith. […]
(Apologies for the hiatus, I’ll be catching up with posting my NaPoWriMo poems this week…) David We’ve stopped here by a ditch, across the sea from home; guns across our chests, peering like Eagle Eyes action men. It’s wetter here, more clouds; the sky drips more, but still I know this grass, this hedge, this […]
Thomas I was dumped at this church, unable to get home; back down the hill into town. This city, this town is deathly sick; my head stoved in with a brick and barrels from the bar. I watch a car toil up Forthriver’s rise, from this hill among the skies. No hallowed stones or weathered […]
Rachel We came up on the tube by district line; we nearly missed our stop. Jumped off at Earl’s Court and running, we just caught the Olympia branch train, a short hop. It put me in mind of the Blitz, the push and shove onto the platforms; the songs, the camaraderie, worried glances at the […]
Roy Bells ringing on the radio, Merry Christmas Everybody, Silent Night; my ma wants a record of carols; I’ll pick one up tonight. I had a wee dance in the kitchen, and she laughed as I shuffled along; the fits have left me limping, and my arm hangs down all wrong. But after all, I’m lucky, […]
Brandy Black and tan, contentious colours, your panting flanks and eager eye. A questing snout quivers to defend; loyalty is your nature, not a means to an end. Drunk, I named you for a drink, But Fido, that tired joke, is your ideal: faithful, trustworthy, except, perhaps, around a meal. Your greed was your doom, […]
John, Joanne, Andrew No ghosts trouble me; Gone for good, oh, gone. Three years, five months, Four bairns, three gone, One left: one. If I could Gather up the days, go back, To that summer afternoon, Our Mark up ahead, wee Jo on her bike and Baby Andrew, oh, my babies. John just catching on […]
Samuel Winter still, the earth brown between wet lanes and the hedges bare like bones. My thumbs, stiff and rough yet twitch for spring, for nature to swing into its well-worn path. The blush of green will creep as always over the Sperrins, the daylight unbend as the dew retreats to misty morns. More than […]
Brian “Watch our Brian,” our ma shouted from the kitchen, elbow deep in peelings. “No bother” I called, plumping down my bag and coat. But when I made a mug of tea, he’d slipped away for a wee dander on the street. I let him have his play, Not wanting to bother our ma. “Your […]
Rosemary It’s the thirteenth today; touch wood. So long I’ve waited, and it has to be this day? Still, I’m doing what I longed for this last three years. But here’s me, crouched in a toilet, fiddling with wires, and I’m to be a teacher! But the cause is right, and casualties regrettable. Touch wood. […]
Linda Her da would sing to her; two years gone now, but loyalty, that widow maker, lingers. His name, etched in stone and statistics troubles her. So she gives it a shot, puts on the serge green, walks the beat; patrols her home town, still a teen. Green, she sticks her neck out, and the song […]
I’ve previously written about my failed experiment with NaNoWriMo and why writing a 50,000 word novel to order in 30 days wasn’t for me. And yet, in a moment of madness and inspiration (I’ve just discovered Northern Irish poet John Hewitt), I’ve made a commitment to write a poem a day for the 30 days of April […]
I’ve just discovered the poetry of Belfast-born writer John Hewitt, which is a shocking oversight for someone writing a novel based in Belfast during the Troubles. But then his name is somewhat overshadowed by those other dazzling Northern Irish luminaries: Seamus Heaney, Louis MacNeice, CS Lewis and Frank Ormsby. I read the poem below and […]
This month’s poem of the month came to me during a work meeting recently; it was a somewhat attenuated review of some annual targets, and the use of jargon and corporate buzz words led my gaze to fall from the screen and out of the window to the street below. Students from the nearby university […]
I’ve just created this new regular feature for 2019, after re-reading some of my favourite poems; it occurred to me that I’d discovered many of them by browsing around online on all sorts of sites, literary and otherwise. Some of these poems have become touchstones in my life, and I revisit them regularly to refresh […]
I wrote this several years ago; the idea came to me during a particularly uncomfortable meeting with a contractor. I keep changing my mind with regards to the title; sometimes it’s “Six Degrees of Freedom”. We meet to discuss resources, not people. Outsourcing, insourcing, TUPEs And how many FTEs We need, and how many are superfluous; We must trim our budgets and our manpower, our undertakings. But it’s ok; they’re only contractors, and road diggers at that. We roll with it. We don’t discuss names but Full-time equivalents Each FTE is a person, each team is two, And a gang is not as it sounds, A menacing mass of uncomprehending brawn, but Four living emissaries, who toil to shift the earth and uncover the cables Whose surge we all live and die by And as we talk, and look at charts And calculate how many people to discard, My eyes swaying, I notice the room divider. Teak veneer, with a trim at each end to hide the workings Of the sliding thing which can increase room volume productivity, Cleave its capacity, double its output. […]
Not my poem, alas, but one that I wanted to feature here; it’s always relevant for the poet, the writer, the artist. Go, my songs, to the lonely and the unsatisfied, Go also to the nerve-racked, go to the enslaved-by-convention, Bear to them my contempt for their oppressors. Go as a great wave of cool […]
