NWW Issue 9 Spring and Summer 2018

NORTH WEST WORDS SPRING / SUMMER 2018 ISSUE 9 

Contributors 

Trish Bennett 

Byron Beynon 

Eamonn Bonner 

Lorraine Carey 

Stephanie Conn 

Noel Connor 

Bernie Crawford 

Patrick J. Cosgrove 

Gavan Duffy 

Kate Ennals 

Frank Farrelly 

Attracta Fahy 

James Finnegan 

Teresa Godfrey 

Deirdre Hines 

Noel King 

Jackie Lynam 

D.S. Maolalai 

Eoin MacGuibhir 

Anne McCrea 

Michael 

Paul Moore 

Maire Ní Bhrian 

Réaltán Ní Leannáin 

Seosaimhín Nic Rabhartaigh 

Gréagóir Ó Dúill 

Dubhán Ó Longáin 

Art Ó Súilleabháin 

Lynda Tavakoli 

Sharon Thompson 

Leo Vanderpot 

Poetry 

Short Story 

Book review 

Paintings 

Photography 

Winning entries from NWW 

2017 Poetry Competitions 

Writing Group Showcase: 

Station House Writers 

Cover photo: High Seas at Mallagh 

Eamonn Bonner 

Ali Znaidi

NORTH WEST WORDS 

SPRING / SUMMER 2018 ISSUE 9 

Editorial 4-5 


Photographs 

Painting: Lucky Shell Beach, Ards Forest , Creeslough, Co. 

Donegal 

North West Words and Donegal Creameries Poetry 

Competition 2017 

6 

7 

Noel Connor Damaged Tins 8-9 

Trish Bennett Galway Crystal 10 

Stephanie Conn Still Life in Landscape 11 

Patrick J. Cosgrove Euphemasia 12 

Gavan Duffy Keeper 13-14 

Frank Farrelly Rivers of Sleep 15 

James Finnegan I was in Lanesborough today 16 

Eamonn Bonner Photo: Passing Rutland Island 16 

Noel King Way to England 17 

Eoin MacGuibhir Séan Dáiliocht 18 

Lynda Tavakoli Dead Dog 19 

Lorraine Carey Painting: Solitude on Downhill Strand, Co.Derry 20 

Photograph 

North West Words and Ealáin na Gaeltachta Irish 

Language Poetry Competition 2017 

21 

Art Ó Súilleabháin Gur fút is breá liom 22-23 

Gréagóir Ó Dúill An Mhucais faoin Nollaig 24 

Maire Ní Bhriain An Dá Thrá 25 

Seosaimhín Nic Rabhartaigh Linntreoga Doimhne 26-27 

Dubhán Ó Longáin Ar Bhruach 28 


Painting: Sea Mist over Glashedy Rock, Ballyliffin, 

Co. Donegal 

29 

D.S. Maolalai Humber River Hospital 30-32 

Eamonn Bonner Photo: High Flier - Seagull 32 

D.S. Maolalai For Melissa, in another country 33 

Attracta Fahy Philemelos 34 

Teresa Godfrey Sudden Death 35 

2



Bernie Crawford Metamorphosis 36 

Ali Znaidi That Magic Within 37 

Sharon Thompson The Healer 38-40 

Michael A Secret 41 

Eamonn Bonner 

Photo: Bronze Statue Hiring Fair Boy, Market Square, 

Letterkenny 

41 

Anne McCrea The Visit 42 

Kate Ennals What Word Would You Choose to Be? 43 

Leo Vanderpot Note Left on a Librarian’s Desk 43 

Jackie Lynam Timing 44 

Paul Moore The Librarian 45-48 


Reflection on Francis Bacon’s Three Studies for a Self- 

Portrait 

49 

Byron Beynon Roots 50 

Réaltán Ní Leannáin Ait 51 

Séan Golden Leland at Cloonagh 52 

Miriam Nic Lochlainn Redemption 53-57 


Deirdre Hines 


Painting: Stonewall Secrets, Greencastle’s ruins, 

Co. Donegal 

Review: ‘You've never seen a doomsday like it’ by Kate 

Garrett 

Painting: Brooding Skies over Benevenagh, Magilligan, 

Co. Derry 

57 

58-61 

62 

Station House Writers Writing Group Showcase 63 

Eamonn Bonner Fanad, The House and The Lighthouse 63 

Ann Marie Gallagher What if Winter 64 

Michael Forde Cuban Crisis, I Corrib 65-67 

Eamonn Bonner Photo: Taking in the View: The Back Strand, Falcarragh 67 

Guy Stephenson Flicker 68-70 

Joe Lynch Avoiding Cliches 71 

Eamonn Bonner Roches Point Automatic 72 

Biographies 73-76 

Lorraine Carey Painting: Stormy Seas -Dunaff Head, Co. Donegal 77 

Eamonn Bonner Photo: Blue Ripple 78 

3



Editorial 

Welcome to the Spring/Summer issue of the North West Words magazine. We are delighted to 

bring you another edition filled with 34 poems and 5 short stories from Ireland and beyond. At the 

end of 2017, North West Words ran two adult poetry competitions - one in English and one in Irish. 

This issue proudly presents the shortlisted and winning poems from both of those competitions. 

Ten English language poems were shortlisted by poet Kate Newmann, with the overall winner 

announced at our January award night: Noel Connor’s poem “Damaged Tins”. Five Irish language 

poems were shortlisted by poet and fiction writer Proinsias Mac ’Bhaird, with the overall winner 

announced at our February award night: Art Ó Súilleabháin’s “Gur fút is breá liom”. Congratulations 

to all the shortlisted poets, and we hope our readers enjoy, as much as we did, the many voices of 

our competition poetry. 

Also featured are editors’ selections from our open submissions of both poetry and fiction, a new 

review section by Deirdre Hines, and a writing group showcase with the Station House Writers. 

Images included in this issue are from Donegal natives, Lorraine Carey (a poet and an artist), and 

Eamonn Bonner (a poet and photographer). 

When Emily Dickinson required a symbol for herself, she chose the wren, clover or spider. She was 

deeply familiar with the biology of such species. Much of her worldview was formed in her backyard 

garden. We are told that human beings are homophilous, that they tend to associate and bond with 

similar others. Homophily is posited over and over again in politics and religion and in much of our 

media as a type of justification for the impossibility of two diametrically opposed sides to ever come 

to a real and respectful understanding of each other. And then we have poets. And the best of our 

prose writers. Human beings who seem only too willing to enter into the reality of another, to 

embrace it, to become it, to write about it, and to offer it to the world at large as proof that we are 

amorphous beings, that we can and do walk in as many different forms as are extant on the world 

surface, and maybe even beyond that. The writers in this edition of North West Words Magazine all 

eschew homophily as a modus operandi. Ali Znaidi's says 'No-one questions the seduction of 

corners' in “That Magic Within”. Attracta Fahy enters the throat of the thrush in “Philemos” and 

Sharon Thompson's central character communes with the creatures in the shadows in her short 

story “The Healer”. 

Writers forage for those truths that hide behind the ostensible meaning of words. Language belongs 

to the people and with poems like “A Secret” by Michael, Kate Ennals' “What Word Would You 

Choose To Be?”, and Leo Vanderpot's “Note Left On A Librarian's Desk”. Language belongs to the 

people and the writers in this section do just that. 

Much writing takes place after deep reflection. Paul Moore's short story “The Librarian” counters 

and subverts much of the homophily surrounding sectarian divide in the North. Just as importantly 

his main characters counter the populist protagonist and think just to think. 

4



“Hugh found it odd that when Bentham wasn't working out how to control people, 

he created the felicific (“happiness-making”) calculus. The calculus claimed to 

quantify the intensity, duration, likelihood and extent of pleasures and pains 

through an exponential equation.” 

We particularly love Beethoven's “Ode to Joy”. One of the mysteries of Art is paradox. Can joy 

spring from death? Does reading a poem in your native language bring peace even if you do not 

remember the meaning of the words? Can translations and free variations of poems dating back to 

844 reinvent those poems and reinvigorate them? The answer lies in the affirmative. 

Byron Beynon's “Roots”, Réaltán Ní Leannáin's “Áit”, Sean Golden's “Leland at Cloonagh”, and 

Miriam Nic Lochlainn's “Redemption” create a solidity by juxtaposing different keys and unexpected 

notes. Just like Beethoven. This edition sees the beginning of our Review Section. 

Kate Garrett's “You've never seen a doomsday like it” published by Indigo Dreams Publishing is 

reviewed by Deirdre Hines. The magazine closes with a selection of poems and one memoir piece 

from some of the members of Station House Writers. The eclectic form of Guy Stephenson's 

“Flicker” makes the reader pause and consider. Annemarie Gallagher's “What If Winter” redefines 

the tradition of fantastical, and Michael Forde's memoir piece “Cuban Crisis” is exemplary. His 

persona poem “I, Corrib” reinvigorates poetry of place. Joe Lynch's “ Avoiding Clichés” cleverly uses 

cliché to question and redefine cliché, bringing us back to where we started. Homophily and the 

power of good writing to counter all that is the worst in us. 

Enjoy. 

Nick Griffiths, Deirdre Hines and Deirdre McClay 

Copyright remains with the author, artist, photographer for all work in North West Words 

5



Painting: Lucky Shell Beach, Ards Forest , Creeslough, Co. Donegal 


6



North West Words and Donegal Creameries Poetry Competition 2017 

Winner: Noel Connor 

Judge: Kate Newmann 

Pictured left to right: shortlisted poets Eoin MacGuibhir, Stephanie Conn, Trish Bennett, 

David Gepp (accepting the Donegal Creameries Perpetual Trophy on behalf of Noel Connor), 

Breid Lindsay (Aurivo/Donegal Creameries) and James Finnegan. 

Competition judge, Kate Newmann 

1st prize winner: Noel Connor reading ‘ Damaged Tins’ at North West Words 

7



Damaged Tins 

Twelve ninety-two forty-one 

my first recital at the Co-op till 

still trips off my tongue, 

a family mantra, unforgettable, 

twelve ninety-two forty-one, 

drummed into all of us by the front door 

and ‘don’t forget the divi’ we were told 

as we each became old enough, one by one 

to cross the busy road and handle money. 

My mother had that shop terrorized, 

poor Mr Drain the manager 

would dread her coming in 

complaining about the wilted veg 

bruised apples or ‘yesterdays’ bread. 

Once she sent me back 

with a single damaged tin, 

‘we’ll all be poisoned by the lead leaking in’ 

and I had to stand in front of him 

repeating word for word 

‘Mammy says …… ’ 

8



Those were the days 

long before the troubles on the road, 

armoured cars and army foot patrol 

the distant sound of city centre bombs, 

the never ending funerals 

filing past the silent shops. 

She died before the worst of it, 

before Black Friday or Bloody Sunday 

or the riots on Internment Day 

when the Co-op was wrecked in revenge, 

when I watched a hijacked truck 

shunt in reverse through the shop front, 

saw the crazy collapse of glass, 

the mangled racks and shelves 

and the kids scrambling in the tangle 

helping themselves to cigarettes and sweets. 

And under the big back wheels 

scattered all across the middle aisle 

a mess of flattened fruit and veg 

and all those crushed and damaged tins. 

Noel Connor 

9



Galway Crystal 

You plied me with champagne in a crystal glass 

the light fizzed in its facets and danced a sparkling ring. 

“No daughter of mine’ll be on time, make him wait.” you said. 

The driver — your brother, slowed the car in agreement. 

When we arrived, the blessed virgin — mounted on granite 

stood guard, Celtic crosses scattered on the grave hill behind. 

A stream flowed under the stone-bridged road to the side 

feeding the lake in front, from where two swans watched 

as you held my hand to support my high, heeled step 

and carried the weight of my frock — the countryman’s Gok Wan. 

We strolled into that church built on immovable rock 

— a slope to its aisle. 

You slipped your arm in mine, laughed as you led me on 

me — with the autumn bouquet. 

Flower girls fizzed to grab hold of us both and towed us 

up that slope, to the altar. 

You sacrificed me there — to face the music 

half cut. 

Trish Bennett 

10



Still Life in Landscape 

When all the colour has drained, unseen, 

from the large painting on the bedroom wall, 

that once was an exact replica of your life, 

with its hills and drumlins, half-hidden caves, 

gilt-edged sky; when the tracks and lanes laid down 

in charcoal have been erased to a grubby smudge 

and you can’t make sense of the emptied spaces, 

and you hate that hope is done with you too soon – 

a single word is enough to make the heart lift, 

to look doubt and madness in the eye and whisper, 

through gritted teeth, be gone! To those still sitting 

in the waiting room, this might be an unremarkable day 

and tomorrow may well smart and sting as you begin 

to pick the thorns from this unpronounceable name – 

today, this word’s a gift; your diagnosis rhymes with joy. 

Stephanie Conn 

11



Euphemasia 

He spoke with grim aplomb 

A doyen of doctoral epithets 

It was an ‘adverse perinatal outcome’ 

Commonly known as death 

The hospital was launching a review 

One of the internal kind 

The interviewer pressed for clarity 

A fog of nomenclature descended 

Procedural protocols would be parsed 

Pharmaceutical practices probed 

Obstetric choices examined along with 

Midwifery management patterns 

Seven fatalities over two years 

Rather a lot it would seem 

He struggled to appease the questioning zest 

Truth falls slowly, like feathers in a storm 

Administrative and clinical paradigms to be appraised 

Searching reviews and reports to be delivered 

Hypoxia, foetal cardiac distress and pre-eclampsia 

Deemed the suspects camouflaging the vagary 

The adverse perinatal outcome remains 

Patrick J. Cosgrove 

12



Keeper 

The first one didn't care for words. 

The first one drank alone, 

gambling and grumbling. 

The first one knew I could never match 

his sadness. 

The first one seemed both safe and sorry, 

the first one took his salty grief 

and stepped soundly into my past. 

The new one says his life is a slow boil 

of aching days , like surly knots 

tied in a rope running through his fingers. 

He grips his spoon overhand 

plunges it into the chilly pot, 

eating last night’s dinner for breakfast. 

He smirks then, claims his stomach 

is empty but his mouth is full. 

The new one covered his watch 

with his hand 

when I asked the time, 

revealed it like a flipped coin 

when I guessed wrong. 

He wrote my name on the back 

of my photograph, 

pressed a fold into its centre 

stood it like an open book 

13



on the windowsill, 

it quietly keeled over 

by the time he was a week gone. 

Tonight I lowered 

a winebottle onto its side 

and slid it off the table, 

it went slowly 

like a ship sailing over the edge 

of a flat world. 

It waits unbroken on the heavy floor, 

minutes slip easily through the clock’s 

empty hands, 

soft aches, sweet tears, 

no music to face. 

Gavan Duffy 

14



Rivers of Sleep 

In her dream, she is unsure he is her husband; 

the black-haired man in uniform 

looks like Tyrone Power 

—so long ago they danced together. 

Waking, she feels ashamed, yet knows how 

love can travel through the rivers of her sleep 

whispering what she cannot tell herself; 

that she forgets how fine he looked 

when they were stepping out, debonair 

in dinner-jacket, wide, fine-lipped mouth, 

now sees him propped up in a nursing-home, 

eyes alarmed, unable to speak, 

visits day and night with dinner mashed 

still warm from home, and bravest smile, 

hands him pad and pen, at his command, 

to write again his wish to die. 

Frank Farrelly 

15



I was in Lanesborough today 

up Delvin Park cul-de-sac last pebble-dashed semi 

on the left beside the big field with pitch and putt 

and tennis courts and children’s playground I am 

studying mathematics or geography in an upper bedroom 

or I’m in some daydream state of waiting my father drives 

up in his long Ford car with lots of electricals in the back 

gets out walks along the driveway in his new tweed suit 

tailored by the local tailor with hidden legs my father tall 

with straight back big chest my heart lifts in welcome 

I was always glad to see him arrive home unless I was in 

a recent bit of bother all he might say after his Hello and 

sharing the latest ESB joke might be I was in Lanesborough today 

it was his way of telling us he had travelled a fair distance that day 

even when I was older he would lay his hand on my forehead 

no words a Connemara man wishing me a silent good night 

James Finnegan 

Photo: Passing Rutland Island 

Eamonn Bonner 

16



Way to England 

I shuffle in the stretch of the geansai you knit me, sister; 

wonder how you’ll like the bedroom all to yourself, brother; 

eat the last of your sandwiches, Mother; 

think over all your do’s and don’ts, Father 

and how I will really get on with Aunty Joan in London. 

I light a smoke at the bar; no smoking ban here yet, 

no need to hide my habit 

till I’m home again, I suppose. 

There’ll be no need to hide my bit of gayness either, 

except from Aunty Joan and her factory-husband, 

till I’m home again, I suppose. 

A man from Woolwich starts to talk, 

he runs a museum of old cars and stuff, 

gives me a card to visit if I’m in the area. 

I hope Customs won’t find the magazines 

with pictures of naked girls, harmless stuff (no bondage), 

I could hardly have let them behind for mother to find. 

Over and over again, I check the bit of paper 

with the name of the man who’s giving me the job, 

his phone number and my PRSI number from Ireland. 

Noel King 

Geansai: jumper/sweater 

17



Séan Dáiliocht 

Limpet, Bairneach 

Holding fast 

Dooey’s black rock harvest 

No duileasc here but dúlaman 

Periwinkles called wilks 

Hiding behind gelatinous fronds 

Picked and bucketed 

Boiled 

Drawn out with sewing needles 

Tasting of the sea 

The Bairneachs sizzling on the 

Hot range top 

The foot chewy, delicious 

A taste acquired 

From my mother 

With the skill 

Of stone striking shell 

Neolithic, in its simple beauty 

The burning of fires 

The sea birds calls, the same 

And each unanswered wave. 

Eoin Mac Guibhir 

18



Dead Dog 

In a unit for the mentally infirm 

I offer you my love in the form of a dog 

so lifelike you expect its tail to wag 

or its soft muzzle to crinkle into smiles. 

It’s a collie – a she, a Daisy-dog to give comfort 

when your night-walls are soughed by the demented 

and God has forgotten the numbered password at your door. 

I have seen the woman with her baby many times, 

its doll head bobbing on her ribs, 

the lullaby that sings upon her tongue 

a comfort only to the bogus child 

immured within those skinned and skinny limbs. 

She walks the ward oblivious to all but 

what contentment comes before 

the longer shreds of darkness that will 

swallow up her memory whole. 

So I tender you my good intent – 

this spurious gift I think will link an alien present 

with the familiar past but even then, 

with all that has been lost to you, 

you recognise its falsity. 

‘That’s a dead dog,’ you say, 

the words raged from that part of you 

still holding on and holding on. 

Lynda Tavakoli 

19



Painting: Solitude on Downhill Strand, Co.Derry 


20



North West Words and Ealáin na Gaeltachta 

Irish Language Poetry Competition 2017 

Winner: Art Ó Súilleabháin Judge: Proinsias Mac a’Bhaird 

Pictured left to right: Proinsias Mac a’Bhaird (competition judge), Art Ó Súilleabháin (1st prize 

winner), Breid Lindsay (Aurivo/Donegal Creameries), and Michael Mac Aoidh (Ealáin na Gaeltachta). 

21



Gur fút is breá liom 

1. 

Is aoibhinn liom 

do shíneadh ar tholg gorm 

do chorp scíthe go socair ag fanacht liom 

tuigeann tú 

2. 


meangadh ag briseadh ort 

do shúile oscailte i ngliondar áthais éigin 

tuigeann tú 

3. 


do bheag chaint ag sioscadh 

ag scaoileadh an tranglam i mo cheann 

tuigeann tú 

4. 


bheith ag liostáil gach dea-rud 

cuntas ar do ghaoine, do mhaoin álainn 

tuigeann tú 

5. 


an tríú uair a chur tú glaoch 

fós ag fiosrú mo chiall ‘s mo shláinte 

tuigeann tú 

6. 


am a chaitheann tú liom 

a shleamhnaíonn uainn i ngrá-chaint 

tuigeann tú 

7. 


do chiúnas in éineacht liom 

ag tóraíocht smaointe beaga fánacha 

tuigeann tú 

8. 


siúl ar thrá leat, lá gaofar 

gléasta don aimsir, clúdaithe ar a chéile 

tuigeann tú 

9. 


do theachta chuig mo chiúnas 

mar aingeal ag síneadh an tosta i mo threo 

tuigeann tú 

22



10. 


mo lámha i do ghruaig 

mo mhéara ag cíoradh na dlaoithe fionna 

tuigeann tú 

11. 


an póg ar chlár d’éadan 

cloch damhsa an locha ag socrú i do chroí 

tuigeann tú 

12. 


focail amhráin a chanann tú 

brí dhomsa amháin, ar do bheola gáireacha 

tuigeann tú 

13. 


meon na dearfachta ionatsa 

an inchinn lán le maitheas na gcleite bháin 

tuigeann tú 

14. 


lán mo bhos de chíoch 

ag ardú na dide le teann foinn ghnéis 

tuigeann tú 

15. 


bheith nocht sa leaba leat 

lom, craiceann le craiceann ag ardú fola 

tuigeann tú 

16. 


an mhaidin le cupán tae leat 

comhartha ar atá fós le teacht an lá sin 

tuigeann tú 

Art Ó Súilleabháin 

23



An Mhucais faoin Nollaig 

Tá giall an tsléibhe crua, glan, teann, gan comhréiteach 

Ina líne dhúshlánach rialóra de chuid Vere Foster : 

Cha dtig a dhreapadh a shamhlú, ach is gá a dhéanamh, 

Ar dhá chois nuair is féidir, ar cheithre ghéag nuair is gá, 

Umhal don tsleas, de shíor in éadan fána, bróga 

Ag polladh chraiceann sioctha an tsneachta, aer sna scamháin 

Ina chara a iarrann barraíocht, ina namhaid a ghearrann mion, 

Géilleann GoreTex an leathair, géilleann na matáin, na glúnta, 

Ach ní ghéilleann an dúnghaois sin atá gan duais, gan loighic: 

Tá súil le carn an mhullaigh agus deoir fán tsúil, 

An spéir faoina léine ghorm ag síneadh ó oileáin Alban 

Go srón Normannach Beinn Ghulbainn. 

Slogann gaoth is sliabh na focail a ghlaonn duine os ard le duine. 

Gréagóir Ó Dúill 

24



An Dá Thrá 

An slua ar fad 

ag déanamh ar an séipéal, 

is ag snámh in aghaidh 

easa a bhíos an mhaidin sin. 

Monabhar na bpaidreacha 

do mo leanúint, 

do mo tharraingt, 

do mo bhagairt 

is buillí rialta 

mo bhróga reatha 

ag tógaint 

diaidh ar ndiaidh mé, 

ar thóir na seandéithe. 

Talamh is spéir, 

uisce, crainn; 

bláthanna Lúnasa 

ag sileadh túise, 

an ghrian ag éirí 

thar Cheann Heilbhic, 

fáinleoga go meidhreach 

os mo chionn 

ag tumadh 

is ag gearradh spéire. 

An tAifreann thart 

sular shroicheas baile, 

bheartaíos freastal 

an lá dár gcionn, 

ag súil gur cuma le Dia, 

cuid mhaith, 

scéal an ghobadáin. 

Maire Ní Bhriain 

25



Linntreoga Doimhne 

Ná tabhair aird ar bith ar na smaointe fánacha, 

gasta, guagacha, luathintinneacha 

A bhrúann iad féin chun tosaigh in gcuilithíní 

Ar imeall linntreog na smaointe 

Mar fhéileacáin phárlúis ag cóisir oíche 

Ach lean na sruthanna malla 

Go lár na linntreoige 

Agus tum go domhain 

Go grinneall fiú, agus fan. 

Fan agus bí foighdeach 

Bí foighdeach agus fan 

Lig do na sruthanna bogadh 

I measc na bplandaí 

’S an duilliúr leathfhasta 

“S na nithe neamh-fhoirmthe 

Atá ag geimhriú sa bhfo-chomhfhios 

Agus le do chruthaitheacht 

Agus le do mhian ’s le do mheon ’s le do thoil 

Chomh luath ’s a fheictear nó a mhothaítear 

bachlóg nó eithne eolais 

Ag corraíl sa doimhneacht 

Gníomhaigh agus feidhmigh 

Feidhmigh agus gníomhaigh 

Tarraing, broid agus láimhsigh 

Ór-eithne an smaoinimh 

mar thaosrán 

26



Taosrán na cruthaitheachta 

Go dtí go bhfuil sé ann. 

Ansin, cothaigh é, 

Neartaigh é, 

Séid air mar a dhéanfá le haibhleog 

Saoraigh smaoineamh an ghrinnill ó ghleothán an bhfo-chomhfhios 

Agus brúigh suas tríd na sruthanna malla 

’S na nithe neamh-fhoirmthe é, 

Thart ar na plandaí ’s ar an duilliúr leathfhásta 

Déan neamart ar na féileacáin phárlúis sin de smaointe fánacha 

Go dtí go mbriseann sé tríd dromchla na réaltachta 

Isteach san anois. 

Seosaimhín Nic Rabhartaigh 

27



Ar Bhruach 

Is tarraingteach an gorm os mo chomhair 

Ní fheicim ach é. 

Mé balbh, bodhar 

Blaisim an t-aer ar mo theanga. 

Is róchumhachtach an gorm os mo chomhair 

Bíogaim 

Cluinim mo chroí. 

I gcéin, tchím páiste 

Agus athair. 

Ní ligeann eagla, nó náire, domh bogadh. 

Is uilechumhachtach an gorm os mo chomhair 

Níl dadaigh ach é. 

Bogaim go mall, go heaglach, 

Ar crith. 

Le teacht i ngar di 

Aimsím crógacht, 

Léimim, amhail Fionn ina óige, 

thar handbrake, thar gearstick, 

Fáiscim í. 

Dubhán Ó Longáin 

28



Painting: Sea Mist over Glashedy Rock, Ballyliffin Co.Donegal 


29



Humber River Hospital 

at the time 

when I worked 

for Toronto's 


it was, 

they said, 

the most technologically advanced hospital 

in all the world 

outside of Dubai, 

with robots running on digital rails 

to deliver pills, blankets and syringes, 

messages 

and samples 

delivered by tube 

and a special system that could track the location 

of anyone in the building 

with gps, 

right down 

to the very portion 

of whatever room they were standing in. 

when I worked at 


we had: 

2 deaths of children caused by errors with the intercom, 

1 attempt by a guy in the ER to steal a gun from a policeman, 

1 woman collapsed in blood on the doorstep and forgotten for 30 minutes by the orderlies 

and 8 escapes from the insane ward on the fifth floor, of which 

3 ended in assaults 

and 2 

in attempted suicides. 

30



I used to walk there 

in the afternoon 

if I was going in for a night-shift 

and starting my day at 3 o'clock, 

and the sun overhead in summer 

would drain sweat 

until my mouth was dry 

and my shirt 

soaking. the hospital 

was located 

outside of the city 

and I lived 

in the middle of downtown 

but there were parts of the walk 

that were not unpleasant. one day in April 

I saw a hawk bring down a pigeon 

right into the roadway 

and cars swerved 

but nobody was killed 

as it stood on it's capture 

blinking 

with chicken-eyed stupidity. 

the control-room office I worked from 

was on the basement level 

right next to the main cafe 

and we spent a lot of time in there talking, 

drinking coffee 

and watching tv. it was in there that the intercom rang out from 

and I knew both the guys pretty well 

that had made the mistakes mentioned earlier. one of them was me. 

but we'd both worked there almost two years by then 

31



and anyone 

who works somewhere for that long 

in a mindless job where the biggest problem most days 

is resetting a robot that failed to detect a door 

can be forgiven 

for making one 

small mistake 

in an emergency, 

right? 

D.S. Maolalai 

Photo: High Flier - Seagull 

Eamonn Bonner 

32



For Melissa, in another country 

I only ever saw you 

in summertime 

when it doesn't take much 

to look good. 

and yet 

I think in winter 

you would have been just as beautiful 

just as much a cat 

just as much a salad flower. your long 

polka-dot dresses, your sweet hair, 

your habit of working way 

beyond when anyone should be expected to work - 

you cured diseases 

constantly 

and love came from me 

constantly 

as I waited for you in bars, 

thinking but never telling you. 

sometimes I hear from you 

and decide 

I should say something 

but we are in different countries 

and love is not enough 

to bring anyone back. 

I know if someone prints this 

I'll show you 

and like a fool 

or a child with a picture 

and hope it matters 

but no, 

even poems don't mean anything 

anymore. 

D. S. Maolalai 

33



Philemelos 

I hear the thrush every morning, 

high on her branch, she hides in ash, 

chirps between sycamore, and yew. Night 

waits quietly, a mother sings in dreams, 

her tufted belly plumage beating rhythm, 

chants the dawn moment. 

Morning moves its colour. 

She cackles, tones intact, 

sings to man and god. 

Since you left, yesterday befell years. 

Her dark bill leads your voice, 

flutelike in phases, po, po po. 

Rise in spirit song, gurgling, ee-o-lay. 

Her voice drifts light between echoes 

Upside down speckled heart, 

black shaped arrows pointing 

upwards, your fine thread, swift 

fingers crochet, ivory, pink, white. 

We rest in your minor keys, your melodic pause 

between notes, pulsating 

heartbeat. Mother, love is a birdsong. 

Attracta Fahy 

34



Sudden Death 

I don’t know what I’d expected – 

that he’d be sitting upright and lazy-eyed, 

looking out the window 

at the front yard 

and the leaning pear tree? 

Or that he’d be lying, long-armed 

and long-legged on the couch, 

eyes only half-closed, 

and looking like he could get up anytime, 

if he really wanted? 

Instead they’d laid him 

in the cold, damp room they never used, 

his long, thin body 

stretched, uncovered, 

on the threadbare floor. 

My disbelief erupted in an unravelling flashback 

of what was being lost, was already lost, 

in this banishment, 

this nether world 

between being and unbeing. 


35



Metamorphosis 

Spinal spikes poke through my skin, 

overlap along my back 

My coccyx stretches, 

drops a scaly tail on the kitchen floor 

The fire starts behind my eyes 

Spews from nasal holes 

Heat melts reason 

Reptile in my brain controls 

My lungs’ pink spongy tissue, 

rises like yeast dough, 

pushes on my rib cage 

I hear my voice box grow 

A bellow surges in my belly 

Propels me up the stairs 

Crashing over discarded paint 

I holler out your names 

You take refuge in the hot press 

Text your dad from there 

Come home quick 

We’re an endangered species 

After the mop up 

my tail contracts 

lungs subside 

my eyes are back in sockets 

But below my spleen 

a squamate grows 

bang in the middle 

of my stomach 

With a flick of tail 

from time to time 

she churns a bloom 

of guilty chyme 

Bernie Crawford 

36



That Magic Within 

Suddenly the wind tosses a thin thread 

as the murmurs into the air are cast wholly: 

No one questions the seduction of corners. 

If there’s magic it is the seduction of seclusion: 

that is concealment. 

There are spiders, threads between corners 

and into corners, there is even the wall 

built upon secrecy. 

The bricks we never question or the muted tongues, 

or such postponed footsteps. How in the voice 

the murmur is enough! 

How in the rainbow 

the dream is enough! 

How is the sun adumbrated? 

How does the rainbow-painted cloud 

give mystery to the rays; that magic within? 

Ali Znaidi 

37



The Healer 

‘The bleeding has stopped?’ Mammy asks the woman in our kitchen. 

'Your own child put her hand on me there now, muttered the prayers in Irish and that was that. 

Your husband saw it too. She's a healer all right, so she is.' 

I like the lady in the fur-collared coat. No-one other than Daddy thinks I'm much of anything. I'm 

supposed to look people in the eye and listen to their nonsense, but sure, all that just makes me 

tired. 

'Does the healing take it out of you, Molly?' the lady asks me in her nice accent. The bigness of her 

stops in the doorway that goes out into the unused front porch. 'You look exhausted now child. I 

cannot thank you enough. You'll have to take something for helping me?' 

'Are you sure it's stopped your bleeding?' Mammy asks taking a wad of notes from the lady with the 

hair curls. 'You didn't check? Are you sure now that it worked?' 

I steal a glance at the fancy lady who came in the huge car, as the squeal out of her is loud. 'Aren't 

you a woman yourself? There's no need to ask me those things with men present.’ 

Daddy slicks a hand over his remaining hair, leans back on the stool by the open fire and puffs on his 

pipe. I know that's the way he is when he's pleased with me. After the woman leaves, and when 

Mammy isn't looking, he'll give me some sweets from the tin on the high mantlepiece, that his 

brother sent him from America. 

I don't notice the woman leaving as I'm away 'with the fairies' as Mammy calls it. There are no 

fairies like Mammy thinks. But, I suppose, I do go away into the shadows of my mind and the listen 

to the dark shapes that I can see out of the corner of my eyes. 

'I've told you time and time again, Nancy. Our Molly has the gift. And that educated woman left us a 

pile of money,' Daddy is filling his pipe with new tobacco and I'm sitting on the floor, pulling the 

stuffing from my doll's stomach and rolling it into little clumps. I feel it scratching against my cheek. 

'When God takes away something, he gives something else. They say as long as the child doesn't 

take any money herself, she'll keep the gifts she's been given. She could be one of the best healers 

around about here.' 

Mammy ties her dark curls back into the red ribbon she likes and slops in the basin on the table, 

washing the best cups the lady drank from. She says, ‘I'd far rather that she'd be like the other 

children.' 

'Even that doctor's wife came to get ‘The Healing’. You should be grateful to the Lord himself, 

Nancy. Our Molly is a handsome child with thick red hair as anyone would be proud of. You can't 

have it all. That doctor's wife there now said it herself; there's no point in us wanting her to be 

different. She’s the way she is and that’s it.’ 

'It's the 1940s! We should be moving away from all the old codswallop of cures and magic. My sister 

says the priest will not like to hear of it at all. You know that Father Sorley is as mad as a bull, when 

he gets the notion.' 

'Molly needs to do this. Tis what they call her destiny.' Daddy puffs on rasping the dark stubble on 

his neck and I smell the socks he's rubbing together in front of the fire. 'She has to do it. Tis God's 

will.' 

38



'Once the bishop and the priests hear that she's performing miracles, you can explain it to them!' 

Mammy spits a bit when she's talking and her beautiful face scrunch up the words. She opens the 

back door and flings the water into the back yard scaring the two scrawny hens, who live despite 

the stone flags and tiny amount of grass. 

'Don't tell me that you're envious of your own eight year old daughter? Jealous of a child that isn't 

the full shillin'?' He's goading her so she'll not miss him when he's out in the pub later. 'She'll need 

something, as no man will take her on despite the pale skin and angelic face. She'll need to be able 

to fend for herself because she's got nothing between her pretty little ears.' 

Mammy wipes her eye with the back of her hand and sniffs a bit. I can tell then that in the silence, 

she's staring at me. They both are. 

'This next one better be all right?' Mammy mutters rubbing her big belly. 'Took long enough to get 

this far again. This next one better come out fine and talk to us properly. It better not be as odd as 

two left feet, like that yolk over there.' She's pointing at me. 

I know they've waited a long time on this baby to come into Mammy. She used to say, 'Tis his fault. 

That thing between his legs ain't good for nothing. He's not someone I should've married. My own 

were in a hurry to be rid of the eldest, with another five daughters to sort out. I married beneath 

myself and I'm paying the price now.' 

That's why, Daddy asked me to rub his bits for him. They both wanted a normal boy and he asked 

me to heal between his legs. It all seemed to work fine. He liked me to do it for him and sure I 

couldn't say no to Daddy. It's our secret though, as it would make Mammy even more cross than 

she is already. Even I know that if she heard I healed Daddy's private place, she'd be livid. Daddy 

said his bother Vincent needed 'the healing' on his mickey too. I know he's not married, so I would 

only do it the once for him and he got angry. 

'Thems for babies,' I told him as I heard the birthing woman talking to Mammy near the butcher's 

about making sure Daddy didn't wear his trousers too tight, or sit too long in the hot baths. 'You 

don't need the babies yet,' I whispered at Uncle Vincent, 'you don't need the healing.' 

He got wild angry when his mickey didn't work near me after that. I'm glad though he's off in America 

now, as I don't like the air about him at all. Healing Daddy is different. I'm of his blood and his 

'favourite girl'. I like it when he whispers how I helped him have another pretty Molly in Mammy's 

tummy. Even I know that the air about Daddy can be wrong sometimes. 

'It's a gift you have,' Daddy's blue eyes are proud. 'Make me better, Molly.' 

He is better since the baby is coming. Mammy's happier too, apart from when she is with me of 

course. 

'I can taste the hate,' I tell Daddy when Mammy's puts on her good scarf and scuttles off to the bus 

to go to her nearest sister's. 'It comes out of her. I can even taste the hate off her.' 

'She doesn't hate you,' Daddy tells me. I can always tell when people are telling me wrong things. 

Out of the corner of my eyes I can see the darkness around their heads. 

'Do you see angels?' Daddy asked me last year when I was doing the healing on his mickey. 

39



Someone told him that the best healers could see angels. I know the nuns think that angels have 

wings and halos and sit in clouds or on our shoulders. They believe it, God love’em. But it's not 

right. I tried to tell them they were wrong about the angels, but they just took to beating me. So, I 

gave up. 

People do have a sort of halo but there's no angels on their shoulders - there's just air. Maybe it's 

the angels breathing that I can see, but I call it good and bad air. People breathe it, surround themselves 

in it and smell of it. 

I always look around people and I find out how their air feels. That tells me all I need to know and 

sometimes the shapes in the shadows tell me things too. They don't use words nor nothing. It's 

hard for me to explain, and I know from the thumping Mammy did on me when I tried to make 

sense of it, that it is better now just to let it be and not think or talk on it too much. 

It's best, for a lass like me, not to talk much at all – about anything. 

'I see air, Daddy,' I told the only person who listens. 'But now that Mammy has a baby in her, you 

won't need The Healing anymore. I'll just heal your air by saying my prayers. I don't need to go near 

you mickey again. I'll sing to the air around ya, and make you better.' 

'I'm a bad man,' he muttered. 

'I know Daddy....' I breathed on him and kissed his cheek. 

'Heal me, Molly. Make me better inside.' 

He was pale then, even Mammy said it. For days he was white as the sheets she made me fold with 

her. I know sometimes Daddy's air still goes bad but I hold his arm and breathe into his pipe and 

turn him good again. Mammy's air is always tight though. I don't seem to be able to cure her from 

anything, or make her love me at all. The creatures in the shadows tell me to leave her be. I try not 

to care about her insides or the heart of her. 

I know babies bring beauty into the world. All the women say it outside Mass when they touch 

Mammy's belly for luck. 

The thoughts of the baby makes me happy inside too. The shadows have told me there's good 

things to come for me. They say that I, Molly McCarthy, will have better times.... maybe the baby 

will bring those good things with him? 

Sharon Thompson 

40



A Secret 

His stale breath. His hollow eyes. He tries to take me into his guise. 

His promises of love wrapped in warped charm, a damaged boy he intends to harm. 

A pious exterior of wit and grace, his sign of peace steeped in disgrace; shame on those 

who allowed him save face. 

Michael 

Photo: Bronze Statue Hiring Fair Boy, Market Square, Letterkenny 

Eamonn Bonner 

41



The visit 

we’ll play tea parties today 

my mother seems to say 

she hands something over 

to me and smiles she nods sagely 

I agree this is a pretty party 

then she tries to kick her 

feet chair bound 

she nonetheless exudes a certain 

energy I look closely at her face 

still a rose on her cheek and her grey 

hair sets it off 

so much like the imaginary 

fine porcelain she handed me 

then time to say goodbye 

my brother so like a minister 

as he presses her arm meaningfully 

leans down to reassure 

part of the pleasure of meeting 

is the saying goodbye 

Anne McCrea 

42



What Word Would You Choose to Be? 

I’d want a word with body, cute with curlicues 

A dainty word that alerts, to inveigle you … 

in close. I’d like a whisper of intrigue, like why, maybe? 

Or I could be a cry, a call of nature, forged 

A word that stutters life, a craw in the back of your throat 

Or the meaningful bleat of a new born kitten 

Trapped in a sack of stones 

I’d like to sound like a badge of courage – suffragette, for instance 

Or be The Scream. Yes, I’d want to be a shout for change 

But, also a word that makes you laugh 

And signals cunning. I’d be a clever word, packed with guile 

A flash of solar, a ray of lunar, scarlet with a green feather boa 

Word of significance. Burlesque? Like a Reubens woman. 

There, I have it. If I could choose to be one word? 

Word I’d choose is ‘flesh.’ 

Kate Ennals 

Note Left on a Librarian’s Desk 

In the midst of a time 

when values are shed 

like house-animal-dander, 

peace a perfect suspect, 

war always in bed, a 

potent rascal on call, 

constant opinions on screens 

with dumb mouths 

unable to pause for fear 

silence will crack 

the space between vows 

of reason and rhyme, 

now's the time to step up 

and shout 

the ultimate outrage: 

"Someone has torn eight 

pages out of The 

New York Review of Books." 

Leo Vanderpot 

43



Timing 

You were part of my plan 

but you arrived too early 

I had a decade of loves 

and losses 

and romantic encounters 

mapped out in my head. 

Ours was a long distance affair 

in that sweltering summer of ‘95, 

that surprised us both with its intensity. 

Despite my intentions, 

I lay bare my vulnerabilities 

And your response was to wrap me 

even tighter in your tender embrace, 

and assure me that 

of course, 

I was worthy of love. 

I responded with tears 

when you told me I was beautiful 

Years of self-criticism had taken its toll. 

I thank the gods that you came when you did 

my miniscule store of confidence 

could not have taken many blows. 

Your every kiss reassured me 

I’m here, 

I’ve got you, 

I’m going nowhere. 

Your timing was perfect. 

Jackie Lynam 

44



The Librarian 

As a librarian, Hugh always felt he was privileged to have knowledge at his fingertips. He could order 

books from around the globe, check their progress as they flew and sailed toward him and then 

welcome each into his world. He was a quiet man, a studious worker who the staff and students of 

the university knew little about. He had perfected the art of remaining inconspicuous, avoiding the 

clatter of the refectory, talking little and focussing on his daily tasks in his specialty area of sociology. 

Hugh regarded Durkheim, Weber, Mauss and Marx as colleagues, if not friends. Now the bright 

eyes in his gaunt face checked the books once more and looked toward the dial of the wall clock. Its 

thin hands read six thirty three. Time enough for Hugh to walk across Derry and the River Foyle to 

the Waterside train station. 

During term, Hugh occasionally returned to his native Belfast on weekends; however this weekend 

was for Mary. He would disembark his train at Coleraine and then catch the bus to the seaside town 

of Portrush and the faded grandeur of the Victorian guesthouse he visited at least a couple of times 

each winter. 

Students largely ignored this anachronism as he slowly walked along the Northland road. His old 

grey overcoat with its green satin inner, his pleat trousers and olive green tie suggested to them he 

was a remnant. Some looked up from mobile phones and smirked; some felt a sort of sorrow and 

Hugh nodded and moved along. From Northland he turned into Asylum Road. He looked at the 

mossy rock of the wall that bordered the left hand side of the street all the way to The Strand 

below. Behind this buckled rock the first asylum in the county of Derry, indeed one of the first in 

Ireland, was built in the 1826. Hugh often imagined he could still hear the inmates. A second asylum 

was built near the Falls Road in Belfast during the same year supporting the thesis that lunacy and a 

state based on sectarianism may indeed be interrelated. Hugh chuckled at the thought and recalled 

ten years earlier, in 1816, William Todd, as the Secretary of the Asylum Commission, had commented: 

“Lunatics abound more in Ulster than any other part of Ireland”. Hugh had lived to see it proven. 

The abounding lunatics, Hugh reasoned, were more obvious in Ulster because the Provence was 

impoverished and the insane poor are more conspicuous than the eccentric rich. A wealthy idiot, 

Hugh had read, could be tidied away as a ‘single lunatic’ by family and friends, as had been members 

of the British Royal Family in 1788, 1801, 1811 and 1916. Hugh loved these odd facts and 

history almost as much as sociology. He loved how as time recedes the vast inequalities and secrets 

of the world become visible. He feared how power in the present obscures the very same. 

45



If pressed, Hugh could have explained how the asylum was designed along the lines of Jeremy 

Bentham’s Panopticon, a template used for many state buildings including goals, schools, hospitals 

and universities. Any place, in fact, in which a supervisor seeks to keep an eye on many people at 

once. The basic architecture consisted of a semi circle, or circle, the centre of which served as an 

observatory. Inmates, students and patients could be held in rooms along thin corridors reaching 

out from the superintendent’s central vantage point. While a superintendent could not watch every 

one all of the time, he or she was granted an overview of every cell within the structure. Hence the 

occupants never knew when they were being observed. This would supposedly persuade them to 

behave for fear of being spied upon. Hugh also understood that the asylum had long been replaced 

by more modern regulatory arms of the state including a technical college, the unemployment 

exchange and the police station, all with new eyes in the form of dozens of CCTV cameras hanging 

at all angles from buildings and lamp posts. As he passed their prying gaze, Hugh appeared wholly 

inconspicuous. Both on and off line, the state found the librarian unremarkable. 

Hugh found it odd that when Bentham wasn’t working out how to control people, he created the 

felicific ("happiness-making") calculus. This interested Hugh more, although he questioned 

Bentham’s faith in the empirical. The calculus claimed to quantify the intensity, duration, likelihood 

and extent of pleasures and pains through an exponential equation. The tidy dream of a reductionist. 

Hugh threw this thought aside as he turned right onto Princes Street. The light here was more 

optimistic and the road led to a better life in the opulent and wider Clarendon. Here the terraces 

were Georgian, chipped red brick, arched doors and French windows. The uneven pains of glass in 

these appeared like dark watery pools and contained bubbles of air trapped for over two hundred 

years. In spring, planter boxes burst with bright flowers scenting the charmed lives of professionals; 

lawyers, accountants, designers and dentists. Masterful women and men whose position and 

income rendered them immune to surveillance and madness. 

Hugh stepped quickly past the dead slab of architecture that was Tesco’s on the Strand Road and 

toward and across the River Foyle via the newly erected Peace Bridge. In the station, his train was 

waiting. He read while travelling allowing the journey to relax and lead him from train to bus, and 

then to the almost deserted seaside town. Built in Victorian times, Portrush was slowly being eaten 

away by the wind and waves. Arriving at the guesthouse he was shown to his room. It was the same 

room he had known over the years with its high walls, floral carpet and bay windows. It was 

magnificently fitted with an assortment of antique furniture that had been gathered from the once 

far reaches of the British Empire. There were Oriental cushions, a rounded brass table from India 

into which was etched a beautiful ink blue peacock, an umbrella and hat stand. The windows were 

bordered by plush curtains and foreign landscapes hung about the walls. A Turkish divan sat close 

46



by the fireplace and beside a huge bed a shaded lamp threw shadows. Hugh opened his case and 

from an ornate box within produced a set of small silver trays and a pipe richly ornamented. He 

waited now for a faint knock at the door and felt his heart jump a little when it arrived. He moved 

across the room and, opening the door, stood facing Mary. Their eyes reached into each other and 

after a still moment they exchanged a gentle kiss. Hugh then led his companion into their 

clandestine world and Mary placed her small travel case on the huge bed. 

The pair had met during the 1960s during the first civil rights demonstrations held in Belfast and 

Derry. Mary was from Dublin and studying botany, Hugh had just finished his arts degree and a major 

in History. Anything seemed possible at this time; the sky like a window. Even a romance 

between a lapsed Protestant and a radical Catholic seemed somehow perfect and blessed. Mary 

and Hugh fell deeply, but as B Specials dispersed the marches, and later, as the Vietnam War 

offered up the bodies of children and the old on television nightly, they grew to understand that 

this love required protection. They retreated into solitary public worlds, Hugh a bachelor and 

librarian, Mary a spinster and botanist. Over time, relatives and friends ceased enquiring about 

romance, ideas of marriage and children. To the outside world, Hugh and Mary appeared isolated 

and reserved; a little shy, and almost certainly frigid. 

Now, as they often did, they would spend their first evening reading together from essays and stories 

that had come to their attention in the months apart. They chewed over world events and 

surprised each other with new ideas and fictions. Their reading was broad and adventurous. They 

loved the careful and the considered as much as the experimental and the fresh. They listened to 

music and drank red wine late into the evening as the coals flickered blue and orange. Then they 

would sleep together, holding each other close and listening as the cold North Atlantic surged and 

gusts of wind caused the window pains to groan. 

On Saturday mornings the pair walked on the deserted beach, along the promenade, listening to 

the green grey sea. They sometimes would fill with bliss and they knew they were among the 

happiest of couples that had ever lived. 

In the evening they often followed a ritual begun years before. They filled Hugh’s Chinese pipe with 

golden brown sap from poppies Mary grew in her greenhouse. She had smuggled seeds into Ireland 

from a botanic garden in London. They laughed like children as the blue smoke rose in thick wisps 

and the opium’s warm embrace overcame them. They had never given up on the idea that such 

pleasure could be a delight on occasion rather than an addiction. It was, to the pair, a way of banishing 

an increasingly invasive state from their bodies and minds, a means of opposing in a very real 

sense what vigilantes, the church and the philistines in government wanted to impose through 

ignorance and fear. 

47



Finally, they would spend the Sunday afternoon writing. They worked carefully in order to leave the 

world and each other a diary. Both wrote simultaneously such that on parting each retained a copy 

in the others hand. Some day, both Mary and Hugh understood, one would return to this room 

alone to mourn the other, stolen through age, death or dementia. This diary recounted the 

wanderings of their imaginations, their meetings, their thoughts and the joys they had found. It 

would remain and would comfort the one left behind. This was their life insurance. Eventually 

who ever outlived the other would place this book in the shelves of the University library. Hugh had 

already created its ISBN, reference and title. They agreed to name the book ‘Joy’, and to list the authors 

as unknown. This book would remain deliberately off the syllabus. They would position it 

among anthropological studies made during the mid to late nineteenth century in a patch of 

peace that sat between the Crimean and World War One. 

Hugh looked now to Mary, he loved her in every sense. Outside the world was a bitter cold while 

here in their cocoon the pair managed to shelter in their own republic. Mary gazed back and they 

both laughed knowing their bodies had grown old, their clothing was well dated, but their minds, 

when they met, where spring. Hugh held Mary and kissed the top of her tiny head, her widow’s 

bun grey and tight. They then made love so softly that angels may have appeared. 

And from this place, early on a Monday morning, they each returned to their lives, so unremarkable 

they became invisible. As Hugh boarded the train back to Derry he looked at the rounded casing 

of the security camera that announced surveillance and simultaneously obscured the cameras aim. 

He laughed and he wondered why Bentham had left us this offspring of the Panopticon instead of 

his happiness principle. He checked his own happiness calculus and found it to be overflowing and 

he reminded himself to look at Spinoza again. Spinoza, Mary would love that. 

Paul Moore 

48



Reflection on Francis Bacon’s Three Studies for a Self-Portrait 

If we were frightened 

we hid it well; 

ratcheting out of control 

just enough and no more. 

The drunk, the boor, 

the perfect charmer. 

We played them all 

right up to the hilt. 

You welcomed the lash, 

the fist, the yielding. 

Submitting to death, 

rebirth, death again. 

And I, in my wild 

and headstrong way, 

sought my own oblivions 

to shield my young and fragile heart. 

Now, in the overlap 

of our reflections, 

we come face-to face 

and gaze at each other’s tender beauty. 


49



Roots 

Hearing my mother speak Welsh 

I am at one 

with her voice, 

that sense of place 

where her tongue 

rests and feels at home. 

I know the language 

breathing inside 

imagination's flame. 

Vowels across time, 

a craft to decipher 

like a scent which bloomed. 

I witness her happiness 

that only the words can bring, 

those natural roots which grow within. 

Byron Beynon 

50



Ait 

Dá mbínn i m’fhear 

chumfainn oidhreacht na gcianta, 

táin is tóraíocht is éachtaí móra. 

I mo shuí go socair ciúin gach tráthnóna, 

ag carnadh mo chuid focal, an ceann amháin ar bharr a chéile. 

I m’am saor. 

Ag deireadh lae. 

Sa chathaoir uilinn. 

Ach tá tachráin agam féin le beathú is le ní is le cur a luí. 

Tá bráillíní nite le filleadh, ‘s veisteanna ‘s stocaí, leis. 

Iad siúd uilig le carnadh i mullach a chéile sa phrios. 

Tá dorn amháin sa doirteal, dorn eile ag stiúradh obair bhaile. 

Éadaí salaithe á gcur sa mheaisín, urlár á scuabadh go híon. 

Lónta á réiteach don mhaidin lá ar na mhárach. 

Leaba. 

Suan. 

Beirt a chromann chun saothair gach oíche. 

Duine acu ina shuí ar a thóin. 

I ndiaidh a shuipéar a ithe. 

Sa chlapsholas. 

Leis féin. 

Réaltán Ní Leannáin 

51



Leland at Cloonagh 

in memoriam Leland Bardwell, 1922-2016 

I 

I live here now, like a goddess. 

Whins grow wherever they want. 

I hang my clothes on shrubs to dry, 

Drink wine in the open air. 

A stone ramp runs into the ocean. 

Clothes scatter over heaps of books. 

I float in the sea, recite poems to the moon. 

The wind will waft me back to the shore. 

––free variation on a poem by Yu Xuanji (844–868) 

Sky and cloud combine, 

Fog and sea are one. 

The Milky Way spins. 

A thousand sails cavort. 

Entranced, I hear the sky 

ask where I’m heading. 

A very long way, I say, 

far past the sunset. 

I write it out in a verse 

that bewilders even me. 

The kestrel surfs a gale 

that will carry me 

past Inishmurray to 

Tir na nÓg. 

II 

––free variation on a poem by Li Qingzhao (1084–1155) 

III 

Anyone can comply with a rhyme scheme 

but I can descrie traces of flowers 

in the dark of the moon 

or brambles dangling in the morning mist. 

Treasure is buried deep. 

I am old enough now to write as I will 

on any kind of note paper but 

I will tell you how it should be done. 

––free variation on a poem by Xue Tao (768-831) 

Seán Golden 

52



Redemption 

Saturday 

I stop running. My breath is sore and rough and cathartic. I crouch over, red faced and sweaty, 

willing my lungs not to burst. My skinny legs are drowning in a pair of borrowed gym leggings with 

an oversized grey hoodie with a dark brown stain on the pocket wrapped around my waist. I am 

alone on this small country road, weaving through this remote part of Northwest Clare. Looking 

around, all I see is flatness and grey. Fifty shades of charcoal. The Burren landscape is as bleak as is 

it beautiful. The long expanse of limestone broken up by dashes of lavender plants, struggling for 

sunlight and defiantly breaking up the cold hardened wilderness. The sickly sweet air a welcome 

change from suburban Ireland grime. 

The only thing I remember about the Burren was a quote from my Junior Cert Geography syllabus. 

When a British Captain came upon the area he said of it ‘There is not enough water to drown a 

man, wood enough to hang one, nor earth enough to bury him’. The irony does not escape me. I 

rub my bandaged arms, tucking down the sleeves of the hoodie over the white gauze. 

My breathing regulates and I notice the darkening sky. Curfew. 

I am a 23-year-old woman with a curfew of 8pm. Although it said on the tacky orange welcome 

handout it was ‘a suggested check-in time’, I know better. At Redemption House Wake up at 7. 

Breakfast at 8. Morning circle next. Therapy. Lunch. Help around the home. Dinner. Free time. Bed. 

Lights out by 10. No phones, no internet, no contact without permission. There is a comfort in the 

reassurance of the schedule. I haven’t spoken to a soul since I arrived. The staff seem nice though 

and the other girls, well, they seem as broken as me, hallowed cheekbones and trauma frozen on 

their faces. 

This has been my routine for 8 days and counting. Ever since that night. That fucking night. Sirens 

and blood and screaming. 

I see the sign ahead for the Burren Perfumery. This has been my routine every day. Run as fast as I 

can, walk to catch my breath and repeat until I hit the sign. And return. This is only sign on this 

never-ending damn stretch of road. The carefully emblazoned letters have been painstakingly 

etched onto the rotting sign beside a small purple flower. Maybe a lavender? I pause and like 

53



always, swallow the desire to keep going. My feet are burning and blistered. My knock-off white 

converse are scuffed and filthy. ‘Those shoes have no arch support’, I hear my Mother’s voice somewhere 

in the back of my mind. I begrudgingly gave her this one. 

I turn and head back, dejectedly. 

I see two women in their fifties approaching. I see them most nights right around this time. I have 

named them Susan and Patricia in my head. The Regatta raincoats, weekly blow dries and hot yoga 

brigade. Walking at a brisk pace that means business they smile a ‘Hello, grand evening now’ and 

both nod a little too hard, not quite catching the sympathy spilling out of their eyes. 

Waiting until they are just enough of a distance away to murmur in hushed tones. 

‘Another one from that grey house, Redemption, is that what it’s called…. Poor girls, awful altogether 

isn't it…Can’t even begin to imagine. Yes well…’ 

‘Anyways, am, what were you saying about your AGA, don’t tell me it’s faulty again. Patricia if I’ve 

told you once I’ve told you a thousand times, that bucko Eugene Maloney that installed it for you is 

a crook.’ 

I arrive at the house just after 8. This two-storied somber grey house has been painted for some 

unknown reason the same color as the ashen limestone that it is surrounded by. God only knows 

why. 

‘Dinner’s on the table, it’s a bit cold now, these walks of yours need better timing,’ a voice scolds 

from another room. 

I slide the plate of mashed potatoes, pork chops and mushy peas into the microwave. Jesus this is 

grim. Not tonight. Not after what happened. I try and chew the dried-up pork chop but to no avail. 

Retching, I throw the plate of microwaved gloop into the bin underneath the sink, grabbing some 

kitchen paper and strategically covering the evidence. 

I grab a glass of water and head up to my room. In the bathroom, I carefully take off the bandages 

and clean my arms. I am still startled at the depth of the angry criss cross slashes. I clean them with 

disinfectant and I press the Savlon on a little longer than necessary. The pain feels good. I bit my lip 

to steady myself. 

I am disconnected here and I feel strangely liberated. I am in a vacuum. I am safe. Having no internet 

is important right now, or so everyone around me keeps saying. Just until things blow over. 

54



I lay back in my creaky single bed with a cheap geometric Ikea duvet set. With love from Sweden. 

No effort spared in making the place cheerful. I play that game my therapist suggested to help me 

go to sleep. Name an animal and then follow it with the last letter of that animal. Tiger. Rabbit. 

Tadpole. Emu. Shit. U have got to be joking. Sighing I inevitably fall in to my never-ending narrative 

of the events of that night. Every time I play it over it becomes more and more excruciating. 

I reach for my suitcase and find my emergency contraband joints rolled up in a pair of socks. I creak 

the wooden window open and sit on the edge, ignoring the wooden splinters digging into the bare 

skin of my thighs. As I inhale I enjoy the tingle it starts sending all over my body, and exhaling I feel 

the familiar sensation of numbing out. I don’t think this is what my therapist had in mind when she 

gave me those bullshit mindfulness breathing exercises to do. I sink into a stoned oblivion as I look 

out onto the Burren limestone wilderness outside. 

The moon is a half crescent and it is a clear night. The light is reflected onto the ground and it kind 

of sparkles and twinkles. A memory flashed. My 11-year-old self, watching a National Geographic 

documentary with my Father. 

‘Did you know that there are as many moons in the universe as there are grains of sand in the 

world.’ The grey haired mustached presenter had said earnestly into the camera, surrounded by a 

backdrop of an ever-moving galaxy. 

Cue my first existential crisis and hysterical crying. Realizing how infinitely small and unimportant I 

was. Dad’s reassurance that I was important to him and that I was his special moon. Every birthday 

card he wrote that he loved me to the moon and back. It was our little in-joke. 

I knew I was at Redemption House as a favor. My mother had called in a personal favor to a old 

college friend of hers who knew somebody. It used to be a convent for nuns, and over the years had 

been repurposed to a temporary home for young women in distress. With the diminishment of 

nuns it had been renamed Redemption house in the 70’s and established to support a growing 

number of Irish women needed shelter and support. 

An ancient framed picture of the Virgin Mary hangs directly opposite my bed. She’s flaking and 

dusting and peeling. I fall into a groggy stupor and my mind casts to previous occupants of this 

room. Women forced to give up their unborn for adoption in the States as they were unmarried. 

Girls barely old enough to menstruate nursing their swollen bellies. And before that, nuns sacrificing 

their lives to a bigger purpose, bigger than what they knew anyways. Maybe they had the right idea. 

Would have saved me a lot of bother. 

55



Sunday 

A bang on the door wakes me. The Virgin Mary is still looking down at me, a half smile on her face. I 

wonder if she approves of the half-smoked joints still on the windowsill from last night. I quickly 

wipe away any crumbs of weed and crank the window wide open to air the room out. 

Day 9. I came to Redemption house the day after it happened. My home town of 27,000 people was 

not enough to dilute the shame. The stares and the nudges. I went to MacBride’s Pharmacy to buy 

shampoo and the cashier smiled so hard, as if she was in pain. I think she was in the year behind me 

at school. I remember she got pregnant in transition year with one of the local Adidas hoods in the 

town. Even she was sympathetic towards me. 

Downstairs, there is a box of cornflakes and a carton milk on the table. I read the back of the cereal 

box in silence, letting the morning catch up to me. There is a word search on the back of the cereal 

box that i peruse through. Sunday means Mass. Optional, but encouraged of course. I will give it a 

miss this morning. There are some of the other girls, munching on cereal and toast in companionable 

silence. We are the heathens that skipped church. 

As it’s Sunday we have some extra free time. I leave the house and head out, taking a different 

route this time. I hop over a fence and start walking over the blocks of limestone, thinking that God, 

or whoever, had been playing a giant game of Tetris, the way they had been slotted into each other. 

I see something up ahead, some sort of plant maybe. I walk slowly up to it and gasp. It is the most 

beautiful tree, still in its infancy, sprouting small flowers from one of the cracks between the slabs. 

Green surrounded by the concrete barrenness. I am in awe. My throat catches and I sob silently. 

Then louder and harder and louder. It is the first time I have cried since. I am shocked by the sound 

of my cries. I lay there my tears fall into the dusty dry crevices. 

I wake up and find myself sprawled out under the tree. How long have I been here. A wave hits 

me. 

I jolt myself awake and run back to the house, taking care not to tumble over the rocky ground. 

I take the small business card out with the number printed on it that had been given to me ‘just in 

case I had changed my mind’. It belonged to a young bespectacled lawyer with kind eyes we had 

met with the day after it all happened. I had sat in her office in silence and listened as a cascade of 

words like ‘litigation’ and ‘indictment’ floated over me. 

I dial the number on the house phone that is only supposed to be used for emergencies. 

56



I clear my throat and speak for the first time in weeks. 

I am surprised at the steadiness and clarity of what comes out of my mouth. 

‘Add me to the list. I’ll testify.’ 

Miriam Nic Lochlainn 

Painting: Stonewall Secrets—Greencastle’s ruins, Co. Donegal 


57



‘You've never seen a doomsday like it’ 

By Kate Garrett 

All of the poems in this pamphlet are recollections. They do not, however, adhere to that well worn 

Wordsworthian dictum that maintains that poetic creation stems from 'emotion recalled in 

tranquillity'. That makes them very interesting indeed. Most of the memories are those the poet can 

not forget, because if she were to do so, she would be erasing the essence of who she is and was. In 

many ways what is unearthed in the twenty poems the pamphlet comprises are the contents of a 

mind's oubliettes. The word oubliette is derived from the French verb 'oublier', which means to forget. 

All of the poems strain against the dual impulses of remembrance and forgetting. 

The poem 'North By Midwest', its epigraph notwithstanding, addresses the theme of home, belonging 

and exile. There is the light of 

“ ..because even though you can't forget the sweetness 

of apple butter on your lips......” 

and the dark of 

“ you also don't forget the way you were forgotten 

unless she needed a punch-bag for her aches 

or he was bored of calling her fat and useless 

and wanted a new game to play: 

you don't forget the way your insides felt homeless 

for nineteen years 

and the way you have a home now....” 

The tawny owls in her back garden softens the loss of the fireflies that lit up the dark in her native 

America. In many ways this pamphlet is a travelogue containing poems as stepladders that the 

reader climbs down or up in order to journey with the poet's coming of age. In the opening poem 

'The circular route', the poet looks back at her reflection in a phone box. Written in three sections 

her loneliness is exacerbated when she tells us she is 'memorising/ a pattern of keys/ no one's 

touched this year'. The poem ends with the poet returning to her reflection. Van Gogh's iconic 

'Irises' is evoked in the poet's iris pupils. She is the white iris in that painting, and the poem ends 

with these two heartbreaking lines: 'a pattern of touch/ no one's memorised this year '. 

58



Not all of the poems manage to harvest the same empathy in the reader. Those that do are stunning. 

I particularly loved the play on belief in 'The devil in the room'. Ostensibly this is a poem about 

summer camp, where a group of girls listen spellbound to the scary stories the poet reads them. 

Interrupted by whom I presume is either the camp prefect or leader, the Bible seals shut the lid on 

what may lie beyond, and 'gore/ and ghouls replaced by a prayer book of brimstone'. Although 

brimstone is an idiomatic expression used to refer to God's wrath in the Hebrew Bible and the New 

Testament, it also evokes the acrid odour of sulphur given off by lightning strikes. The title of the 

pamphlet refers to the apocalyptic doomsday. This is one of those moments. A moment when the 

poet correctly and brilliantly refers to her listeners as 'a murder of nervous/ crows in the moonlit 

cabin', and when she first understands the power of words to control that murder through stories 

and myth. The season is Summer but the tone is wintry. The prose poem ' Peanut butter moon ' has 

one of the best closing lines in the whole collection; 'a consolation prize for coming back from the 

dead'. The festival is All Hallows Eve and the poet has outgrown her fourth grade hippie-witch 

skirts. She is ten and her prize is a chocolate bar clutched to her chest 'like a dark moon medal'. 

Some of the titles of the poems in this pamphlet are poems in and of themselves. Monostichs that 

beguile the imagination and that send the reader into their own reverie. ' Anarchy called collect and 

I was happy to answer ' is one such title. The season is spring and the date is Friday the 13 th . This too 

is a prose poem. The poet is on the cusp of adulthood at seventeen and has parked her car in a tow 

zone, abandoned caution and entered with her friends an area her mother had warned her would 

happily see her dead. ' Home was twenty miles east........where fear was a deer in our headlights, 

where the scariest thing was the hearsay/ gathering of devil worshippers at the covered bridge'. The 

transition from Friday night into her tiptoed return home in the early hours of Saturday morning is a 

metamorphosis. The poet has survived by taking a chance, albeit on a tow zone. That risk taking will 

pay dividends in the poem from which the pamphlet takes its title. The man who picks up the two 

'sweat-and-dirt sculted/ children' on the eve of the millennium agrees with their decision to go to 

England. To London. 

...” 2000 isn't going to be pretty. These cornfields will burn. 

Houses will be searched, he says, and I'll be dragged away 

like the rest........” 

All of the Abrahamic religions believe in the Apocalypse, which explains its prevalence in the not 

only the dominant culture, but also in the counterculture. The poet too changes her five dollars into 

sterling because she believes it too. The last lines confirm this: 

59



… “I will change pounds to sterling, while they're 

still worth something, while we have the choice.” 

The oubliette that is opened in 'Something you see in the movies' concerns male privilege, and 

a room with two girls in it, and a bathroom: 

… “but the tiles are cold on my palms 

and the tiles are cold on my knees..” 

She performs oral sex but only because she is told and because 'adrenaline beats dopamine' and 

because the dominant myth of a society that glorifies obedience to the male hides the real meaning 

of the verb 'to rape' in oubliettes of their own mythmaking. This is a poem that deserves a lot of 

attention. And discussion. 

One of the ways the poet assuages her trauma is through a belief in a gentler type of supernatural. 

‘Meeting Tink in a bar in heaven' is the best of these poems. The other is 'Adrenaline and sassafras'. 

I enjoyed the way Garrett plays with our expectations here, as in the last couplet: 

.. “and tells me how I'd love her new friends 

because they are absolute angels.” 

As the collection draws to a close the poem 'Less like fiction' sees the poet in a healthy and 

nurturing relationship. The nightmares are more distant now, nightmares where she doesn't know if 

she'll ‘make it out of these oubliettes alive.' She has though. She has written and lived survival. 

Her partner has suffered trauma too, and they both are entering a new summer, a new season of 

hope. The last two poems remember their wedding vows and the children she has carried to full 

term and those she hasn't in 'Gravida 5, Parity 3'. Gravida describes the number of confirmed 

pregnancies that a woman has regardless of the outcome. She recalls her first little never-sprouted, 

and as the pamphlet closes we are left with an image of small scout mapping a universe its mother 

shall never know. Parity is defined as the number of births that a woman has had after twenty 

weeks gestation. These children mark the way forward even as she looks back at the children she 

has lost. 

Kate Garrett is known on the poetry scene as founding editor of Three Drops Press/ Three Drops 

from a Cauldron, and Picaroon Poetry. This pamphlet assures her authority in a collection that 

brings its reader into the underworld and overworld that gifted us a poet that looks back in order to 

look forward with altered iris. Published by Indigo Dreams this is a pamphlet that will serve as a lantern 

of light for those hampered by roots on their path out of the forest. A must buy. 

60



Indigo Dreams Publishing Ltd. 

61



Painting: Brooding Skies over Benevenagh, Magilligan, Co. Derry 


62



Writing Group Profile: Station House Writers 

We are a group of like minded individuals who are known collectively as the Station House Writers 

and who have penchant for the written word, including a little bit of prose, a smattering of poetry 

and the ubiquitous short story have been meeting regularly in the Station House Hotel, Letterkenny 

to hone their skills. 

In 2016 the group benefited from the support of Donegal ETB which facilitated the running of 

dedicated workshops under the Community Education Programme under the tutelage of renowned 

and much published local poet and playwright, Deirdre Hines. The writing by the group was 

presented at a public performance in Kelly's Corner, Letterkenny, on August 18th 2016 

Some members of the group have had their work accepted for publication since the programme 

commenced which is very encouraging news for the group to progress further in their writing 

pursuits.The group meet monthly in the Station House Hotel and are regular readers at literary 

events in the Letterkenny area. 

The group consists of Ann Marie Gallagher, Guy Stephenson, Joe Lynch, Michael Forde, Deirdre 

Hines and Eamonn Bonner, many of whom have shared their work in the following pages. 

Photo: Fanad, The House and The Lighthouse 

Eamonn Bonner 

63



What if Winter 

If winter was a girl, her name would be Alice, 

Dressed in colours of Aurora Borealis. 

A bracelet from Saturn, with rosy cheeks from Mars 

and a diamond on each ear she plucked from the stars. 

The light of a full moon as her guide in the dark, 

dancing on snowy lands, never leaving a mark. 

If winter was a boy, then his name would be Jack, 

he’d wear a wool coat from Jupiter off the rack. 

Laughing, he’d freeze the lands without any malice, 

slip Venus in his coat in case he’d meet Alice. 

From the Northern lights he would extract the green glow, 

pretend to be a Jedi, jumping in the snow. 

If winter was a man, his name might well be Joe. 

He’d wear a white cap and a jumper made of snow. 

Ice for a mirror with an icicle he’d shave 

and give Jack a few lessons on how to behave. 

Skiing down icebergs, he’d be a sight to behold, 

breathing in freezing air, never catching a cold. 

If winter was a woman, her name would be Gail, 

in a shimmering cloak of snowflakes and hail. 

With grace she would order with a wave of her hand; 

both land and creature obey her command. 

On silver skates she’d glide at her ease 

and request the wind to blow snow off the trees. 

Aurora Australis would light up her palace. 

At Christmas she’d invite Joe, Jack and Alice. 

While putting on skates they would watch penguins play 

and laugh when the seals would chase them away. 

Then, if a magic wand was waved by a wizard, 

all would disappear into a swirling blizzard. 

Ann Marie Gallagher 

64



Cuban Crisis 

“The world is supposed to end at three o’clock today, everyone says”, said Liam. 

“That’s right,” I said. “That’s when the Russian and American navies will clash if the Russians don’t 

turn back.” 

“What will we do?” says he. Liam was my younger brother and looked to me for answers. 

“Have you any money in your post office book?” 

“I’m skint.” I said. 

“Well I have” says Liam. “No use leaving it there.” 

Off we went to the post office and Liam withdrew his savings. At that time, you could save by 

means of saving stamps, which you bought in the post office and put into the book. We made hot 

foot to Kirwan’s sweet shop at the corner of Abbey Lane. We spent most of the money on bottles of 

lemonade, chocolate, liquorice allsorts and Emerald sweets – all top of the range stuff. Then we 

headed for Abbey Lane, climbed on to the Convent wall and began stuffing ourselves. 

Mrs. Flaherty lived with her daughter just across from where we were sat on the wall. She came to 

the door. It was two o’clock. We asked her was there any news. 

“The ships haven’t turned back,” she said. Tension was increasing all over the world and in Abbey 

Lane the pressure was on. 

“I hope the Americans win,” says Liam. “They’re all good guys.” 

“Yes,” I said. “Them Russians are a sour looking crowd with their grumpy faces and their cheap baggy 

suits. Did you see that baldy bollocks Khrushchev taking off his shoe and banging the desk at the 

U.N.? If those guys win we’ll have to work for nothing and turn into commies. If they try to turn us 

into commies, we’ll have to die for the faith, so Father Freddie says. Ah, he’s not playing with the 

full deck.” 

“Boys, they still haven’t turned back,” Mrs Flaherty said coming to the door. “We’re going to say the 

rosary. Will you come in and say it with us?” 

“Ah, it’s ok Mrs. Flaherty, we’ll say it out here,” I said. “Pass us the liquorice allsorts, Liam. I hope 

the Yanks win this war. The Russians never did anything for us. The Americans gave us cowboys, 

Hollywood… John Wayne, Charlton Heston, Paul Newman. Yea, and parcels at Christmas from 

Auntie Delia in San Francisco and dollars from Auntie Margaret.” 

“Boys, the ships are turning back, they’re turning back,” shouts Mrs. Flaherty as she came running 

out the door. “Thanks be to God, that’s great news Mrs. Flaherty”, we both said. We clambered 

down off the wall bloated from all the sweets and lemonade. 

“Oh shit, me moneys all gone,” says Liam. “We’ll hide the book and say nothing!” says I. 

Crisis over, we headed for home. 

Michael Forde 

65



I Corrib 

ease out from this lake 

of many 

islands 

meander through the cut 

down by Menlo Castle 

where 

at regatta time young 

men and women 

have tested 

their mettle in contest - 

Raftery wrote of the tragedy 

of the Annaghdown people 

who 

landed their sheep 

for the Galway fair 

at Steamer’s Quay – 

I plunge past three 

grey pillars, where Clifden rails 

carried 

young Connemara men 

clutching battered suitcases 

to English building sites 

from stony fields 

speaking quietly “as Gaeilge 

like their fathers 

and over the weir 

salmon await the call 

to spawning grounds 

66



standing guard 

over storied Claddagh 

as swans 

float by 

and laze by 

the sunny shore 

courtiers at the Court 

of the King of Claddagh. 

Michael Forde 

Photo: Taking in the View: The Back Strand, Falcarragh, Co. Donegal Eamonn Bonner 

67



Flicker 

1 

The child sees 

on black and white 

television 

girls and boys run, 

flicker past 

broken houses 

piles of rubble, 

wearing smocks 

black hair white faces 

wild eyes 

legs and feet bare 

splash through puddles 

mouths wide ‘O’s 

or lips stretched tight 

in rictus grin 

The watching boy, 

five years old, 

asks his mother 

What? 

It’s a war 

a long way 

from here, 

in Korea – 

they are refugees, 

have no homes 

or mummies 

or daddies 

68



The boy asks 

his mother 

Why? 

It’s a long story 

she says…….. 

2 

The man sees 

each day on screen 

Homs 

Aleppo 

Sana’a 

and many, many more – 

hears pundits 

of economic recovery 

talk of rising shares 

bullish markets 

where commodities of war 

are made with exquisite skill 

that will render each bazaar 

to rubble, make of lamp post, 

railing and bicycle frame 

a sculpture bizarre 

Fled from afar 

daughters of Adam 

sons of Eve, 

children of Hagar 

69



and Sarah 

share courage, 

hang on to hope and 

howl their outrage 

into song, fashion 

images from confusion 

make stories, 

with their creative 

minds and hands, 

begin to sculpt their 

lives anew, 

so flicker 

can warm to 

steady. 

Guy Stephenson 

70



Avoiding Clichés 

Avoid the clichés, have a bit of class, 

but everyone knew he was as bold as brass 

stubborn as a mule, 

knew absolutely nothing of working to rule. 

Alas he knew that all for one and one for all 

is not that real when pride comes before a fall 

and that all that glitters is not gold 

but in everyone, there is a story to be told 

Admitted that the carrot and stick 

may be hard to lick 

and that the benefits of wait and see 

go hand in hand with whatever will be, will be. 

Actions speak louder than words, they say 

others shake their heads with that’ll be the day 

while everyone knows, the best things in life are free 

not forgetting that the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree 

Against all the odds, this didn’t change his tune 

nor make him look for the elephant in the room. 

If this was the dancer blaming the stage 

then judging the book by its cover is also on the page 

Joe Lynch 

71



Roches Point Automatic 

From the glass jug, he poured some water into ‘the usual’ that had been set down in front of him on 

the counter – always the same measured drop. Then, he swirled the water and the spirit around a 

few times in the glass. When it stopped moving, he took his first long sip. 

He stood alone among the wooden stools. Frank, the owner of the bar was at the fireplace, noisily 

shovelling ashes into a grey metal bucket. A plume of ash dust rose up around him as he knelt in 

front of the old wooden top fireplace with the cracked and faded coloured tiles. 

Apart from the two men, the place was empty. The front door was held open by a bucket and mop 

to let air in to dry the newly washed floor. The smell of Jeyes Fluid lingered in the air, a triangle of 

sunlight lay on the shining floor. The only voice that sounded in the room came from the radio, 

which sat on a high shelf behind the bar. 

‘’And now the sea area forecast at twelve noon Roches Point Automatic North, North West 8 Knots 

Mist. Greater than 10 miles. One thousand and thirty two. Falling slowly’’ 

“Frank, Frank - is all them lighthouses gone automatic now- no one minding them anymore?” 

After a pause and taking a deep breath, Frank tiredly replied, 

“What lighthouses are they, Gerry?” 

“Them ones, all around the coast ,”Gerry said – and pointed a finger towards the radio. 

Frank was rolling up newspapers tightly, then putting firelighters and small kindling sticks together 

into a small pile in the grate. 

“Aye, I think they’re all automatic now,“ he said over his shoulder. “And Frank, where’s Roches 

Point?” 

Frank is striking matches now –one, two, three in quick succession. The papers start to catch fire 

quickly and the kindling begins to crackle, sending flames leaping up from the grate. 

“Roches Point, let me think.” 

“Roches Point ,” said Gerry, “must be somewhere Frank –Roches Point Automatic.” 

“It’s somewhere all right, maybe it’s in Cork, “ he said. 

Using a long black tongs, Frank added lumps of coal carefully one by one to the fire. When he had 

made a pyramid of coal around the flames, he picked up the bucket and walked away towards the 

door marked PRIVATE at the far end of the room. 

As he walked, he said to himself- but half loudly, 

“Roches Point Automatic. I wish I was there now, wherever it is!” 

Frank left the room, the creaking door’s arm closed the door shut behind him. 

Gerry stood alone at the bar. 

He swirled the drink again and watched it spinning around in a circle in the glass. When it stopped 

moving, he took his last long sip. 

With a deliberate clink, he tapped the empty glass down on the counter, shook his head a few 

times and walked out outside, into the sunlight. 

Eamonn Bonner 

72


SPRING / SUMMER ISSUE 9 

Biographies 

Trish Bennett won the Leitrim Guardian 2017 & 2018 Literary Awards for poetry and was long listed for the 

“Over the Edge ‘New Writer of the Year Award” in 2013 with her first essay about men and their sheds. Her 

work has been published in several magazines and anthologies, online and in print and on BBC Radio Ulster. 

She is a member of Women Aloud Northern Ireland and is working towards her first anthology of poetry. 

Byron Beynon lives in Wales. His work has appeared in several publications including San Pedro River Review, 

Agenda, Cyphers, Plainsongs, Crannog, Poetry Pacific, London Magazine and the human rights anthology In 

Protest (University of London and Keats House Poets). Collections include Cuffs (Rack Press), Human Shores 

(Lapwing Publications) and The Echoing Coastline (Agenda Editions). 

Eamonn Bonner is from the fishing village of Burtonport and true to his roots ,many of his photographs are 

of the coast and the sea. Eamonn's last solo exhibition was in Cafe Blend Letterkenny. His photographs have 

featured in books, magazines and local newspapers. 

Lorraine Carey Lorraine Carey’s a poet and self-taught artist, specialising in oils and watercolours. A Decorative 

Glass Designer by trade, she often uses natural materials such as slate and stone as well as glass in her 

work and uses her rural surroundings as the focus of many pieces. She draws on inspiration from wildlife, 

flowers and birds. Sea and landscapes feature mainly in her oil compositions, capturing the myriad of changing 

colours within the ocean, skies and the rugged contours of Ireland's stunning coastline. All Lorraine's art 

to date, features on her page Lorosio Art https://www.facebook.com/CareyLorraine1/ 

Stephanie Conn is a former primary school teacher and graduate of the MA programme at the Seamus Heaney 

Centre. She won the Yeovil Poetry Prize, Funeral Service NI prize and the inaugural Seamus Heaney Award 

for New Writing. She has read her work locally, nationally and internationally. Her first collection, ‘The Woman 

on the Other Side’ is published by Doire Press and was shortlisted for the Shine/Strong Award for best first 

collection. Her pamphlet ‘Copeland’s Daughter’ won the Poetry Business Pamphlet Competition and is published 

by Smith/Doorstep. Her next collection, ‘Island’ will be published in May 2018 by Doire Press. 

Noel Connor ‘s scholarship combined Fine Art with Irish Literature. As an artist, he has collaborated with Seamus 

Heaney, Tom Paulin, Gerald Dawe, Maura Dooley, Rodney Pybus and John Heath-Stubbs. His artwork 

has always maintained a close affinity with the written word but increasingly his own poetry has emerged. In 

two recent exhibitions at the Verbal Arts Centre in Derry, one with his good friend, the Donegal based photographer 

David Gepp, poetry provided the stimulus for much of his new visual work. 

Patrick J Cosgrove has been dabbling in things 'poetic' for many years, across a range of subject matter, content 

& style. A core focus to date has been on various sociological & healthcare issues (esp. mental health), 

though he has also embraced nature in all its inspirational splendour and symbolic allegory. His current curiosities 

& poetic adventure hover in & around the zone of 'interpersonal dynamics', and how that may be creatively 

articulated through various arts media... poetry inter-alia. This evolving after many years working as a 

therapist in various settings across the age, ability and wellness spectra. 

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Bernie Crawford from Co Galway, is on the editorial board of the popular poetry magazine Skylight 47. Her 

poetry has been widely published. In 2017 she won first prize in the Poetry Ireland/Trocaire competition and 

was shortlisted in the Fish Poetry competition. Previously she won first prize in the Dead Good Poetry competition 

2013. 

Gavan Duffy lives and works in Dublin, he is a member of Platform one writers group and has previously published 

in Crannóg , the Stinging Fly, The Stony Thursday Book, Poetry Ireland, Boyne Berries, New Irish Writing 

among others. He was shortlisted for a Hennessy Award in emerging poetry in 2014.He is currently working 

on a first collection. 

Kate Ennals is a poet and writer and has published material in a range of literary and on line journals (In 

2017, she won the Westport Arts Festival Poetry Competition. Her first collection of poetry At The Edge was 

published in 2015. Her second collection, Threads, comes out Spring 2018. She has lived in Ireland for 25 

years and currently runs poetry and writing workshops in County Cavan, and organises At The Edge, Cavan, a 

literary reading evening, funded by the Cavan Arts Office. Her blog can be found at https://kateennals.com/ 

Frank Farrelly is from Waterford. His poems have appeared in many magazines. He has been shortlisted for 

the Writing Spirit Award, won Second Place in the Doolin Prize, Poets Meet Politics and North West Words. 

He was a runner-up twice in the Fish Poetry Prize, and won First Place in the inaugural Rush Poetry Prize in 

2017. His first poetry chapbook, Close to Home, was published last year, with the help of a bursary from Waterford 

Arts Office. 

Attracta Fahy grew up on a farm, she had a close affinity with nature, animals and birds. Her background is 

Nursing/Social Care. She works in private practice as an Integrative/ Humanistic Psychotherapist/Supervisor, 

also a group Facilitator/Trainer. She is lives in Co.Galway, and completed her MA in Writing NUIG in 2017. She 

is a mother, supporting three children through college. Attracta is presently participating in the OTE Poetry 

Workshop with Kevin Higgins. She always loved reading poetry, and recently began to enjoy writing her own, 

her passion is reading and writing about, humanity, nature and soul. 

James Finnegan was highly commended in the Patrick Kavanagh Poetry Competition 2016, shortlisted for 

Over The Edge New Writer of the Year, published in The Bombay Review and The Canterbury Festival Anthology 

for Poet of the Year 2016. In 2017 he was published in Skylight47, Sarasvati, North West Words, CYPHERS 

(May and November) and had three poems shortlisted in the Canterbury Festival Anthology for Poet of The 

Year 2017. Two of James’s poems featured in New Irish Writing in The Irish Times. His first full collection of 

poems published by Eyewear Publishing is available in June 2018. 

Teresa Godfrey, in the last two years her poetry has been placed in the Highland Poetry Challenge, Illinois, 

and the Bangor Poetry Competition; shortlisted for the Allingham Poetry Award 2017 and the Eyewear Fortnight 

Prize; read at the Bangor, Co Down Holocaust Memorial Event, 2018; published in Corncrake; the 2018 

Poetry in Motion anthology, and in The Curlew. Teresa has also had short stories published in The Honest 

Ulsterman, Crannog, and Boyne Berries. She is currently working towards a poetry collection. 

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Noel King was born and lives in Tralee, Co Kerry. His poetry collections are published by Salmon: Prophesying 

the Past, (2010), The Stern Wave (2013) and Sons (2015). He has edited more than fifty books of work by others 

(Doghouse Books, 2003 – 2013) and was poetry editor of Revival Literary Journal (Limerick Writers’ Centre) 

in 2012/13. A short story collection, The Key Signature & Other Stories has just been published by Liberties 

Press in 2017. www.noelking.ie 

D.S. Maolalai recently returned to Ireland after four years away, now spending his days working for a medical 

supply company and his nights drinking wine. His first collection, Love is Breaking Plates in the Garden, was 

published in 2016 by the Encircle Press. He has twice been nominated for the Pushcart Prize. 

Anne McCrea lives near Strabane in the North of Ireland. She has lived in France, England and Belfast. Her 

favourite second language is French. She lives alone with her cat Snowy; enjoys walking in Donegal; attends 

from time to time Derry Writers’ Playhouse Group and a writing class in Strabane for those in recovery from a 

Michael is a homeless man in Derry City. He's currently in temporary accommodation and battles addiction. 

Poetry keeps him creative and attentive on moving his life forward. Michael enjoys nature and dislikes nonbiodegradeable 

coffee cups and the word 'hate'. Twitter: @HomelessDerry (Stop by and say hello!) 

Paul Moore’s writing includes stories, plays and academic publications. He trained in acting and became a cofounder 

of Brink Productions which continues to produce in Australia and later AnNua in Derry. Paul is an 

Honorary Research Associate of the University of Sydney and seeks to allow his research, writing and acting 

to inform each other. Recent publications include Derry: City and Cultural Capital and The Swim, a short story 

shortlisted for the Penguin Business Weekly Short Story Prize 2016. AnNua: https://annuaproductions.org/ 

Paul Moore Writer: https://paulmoorewriter.wordpress.com/contact/about/ 

Máire Ní Bhriain Cónaíonn Máire Ní Bhriain gar do bhaile mór Loch Garman, áit a bhfuil sí bainteach le Conradh 

na Gaeilge agus le Club Leabhar Gaeilge . Tá cúig leabhar filíochta Béarla foilsithe aici agus le déanaí tá 

Sparánachtaí Litríochta faighte aici ó Comhairle Chontae Loch Garman chun cabhrú léi saothrú as 

Gaeilge .Bhuaigh sí Duais Fhoras na Gaeilge 2017 ag Seachtain na Scríbhneoirí i Lios Tuathail . Is minic í ar 

cuairt chuig gaolta i nGaeltacht na Rinne, Co. Phort Láirge agus gach samhradh le fiche bliain anuas déanann 

sí freastal ar Dhaonscoil na Mumhan i gColáiste na Rinne . Rinne sí freastal le déanaí freisin ar Oideas Gael i 

nGleann Cholm Cille i nDún na nGall . Seinneann sí ceol le Wexford Folk Orchestra agus is breá léi na damhsaí 

seite freisin. 

Réaltán Ní Leannáin Tá idir dhánta is gearrscéalta foilsithe ag Réaltán Ní Leannáin. Tá blag aici http:// 

turasailse.blogspot.ie/ agus leathanach Facebook https://www.facebook.com/Realtan2/ 

Dhubhán Ó Longáin As Bealach Féich i gContae Dhún na nGall do Dhubhán Ó Longáin. Bhain sé fochéim sa 

Ghaeilge agus iarchéim taighde amach in Ollscoil Uladh. Tá sé anois ina mhac léinn múinteoreachta i 

gColáiste Ollscoile Naomh Muire. Bronnadh cuid mhór duaiseanna air agus é san ollscoil. Ar an duais is mó, 

bronnadh an Richard K. Degenhardt Belleek Collectors' Scholarship 2016 air mar gheall ar a thaighde nuair a 

chuir sé eagrán béil de laoi Fiannaíochta in eagar. Tá dánta leis foilsithe in An tUltach, North West Words, 

Peann ar Pháipéar, Feasta agus Comhar. Bhain sé an chéad áit amach sa chatagóir Gaeilge den France 

Browne Bicentennial Poetry Competition. 

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Art Ó Súilleabháin now lives in Cornamona in north Connemara, on the west coast of Ireland. He has published 

a number of books in Irish for children and is now working on a collection of poetry in English for adults. 

He has recently been shortlisted for the Bridport, Ex Ophidia, Over the Edge and Words by Water literary 

events. He has six wonderful children Aoibhinn, Eoin, Cian, Darach, Fiachra and Art óg. Fiachra, who is an 

artist, now lives with him in Cornamona, while working towards an exhibition in Dublin in 2018. 

Lynda Tavakoli facilitates an adult creative writing class in Lisburn, Northern Ireland, where she lives for most 

of the year. Her poetry and prose have been broadcast on BBC Radio Ulster and RTE Sunday Miscellany and 

she has been selected as The Irish Times Hennessy poet of the month for her poems about dementia, a recurring 

theme in much of her poetry. Lynda has won poetry and short story prizes at Listowel and her poems 

have been included in a wide variety of publications across Ireland and the UK. Most recently her poems have 

been translated into Farsi while others have seen publication in Bahrain. She is presently in Oman where she 

is working on her debut poetry collection which she hopes to publish later on this year. 

Sharon Thompson lives in Donegal and writes anything at all. Her debut crime novel The Abandoned was released 

by Bloodhound Books UK in Jan this year at #1 in Irish crime fiction on kindle. She has signed for two 

more crime novels with Bloodhound Books. Her regular column is Woman's Words on Donegal Woman and 

she founded #Indulgeinbooks on Indulgeme.ie and a trending writing tweetchat called #WritersWise. Her 

website is http://www.sharontwriter.com 

Leo Vanderpot lives in Croton-on-Hudson, New York. His poems and fiction have appeared in a number of 

journals, most recently in The Aurorean and Third Wednesday. His poem 'Gerald,' came out in the first issue 

of the now-gone-dark journal Anon, published in Edinburgh, Scotland. “Fear,” a memory-piece about growing 

up in the Boston area, saw light at Snowbound. Email him: leov10571@yahoo.com 

Submissions welcome 

North West Words is published in May and November. The next submission deadline is September 

30th 2018 and submissions will be accepted from 01 st August 2018. 

Please submit no more than 3 poems or 1 short story (max 2000 words), non-fiction piece (max 800 

words) or flash fiction (max 500 words) or jpegs of photography/art, as an email attachment with 

‘NWW magazine submission’ and whatever category you are submitting to, as the subject of the 

email. Include a short biography (50- 100 words) in the third person and a photo along with any 

links to your website/blog/twitter/etc. 

All work must be the original work of the writer/artist and previously unpublished. Copyright remains 

with the writer/artist. 

At the moment, we cannot pay for work we publish. 

Email Submissions to: northwestwords@outlook.com 

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Painting: Stormy Seas -Dunaff Head, Co. Donegal 


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Photo: Blue Ripple Eamonn Bonner 

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NWW Issue 9 Spring and Summer 2018

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