Poetry Iain Campbell Pages 67-68 Flash Fiction Mandira Pattnaik Pages 69-70 Poetry Billy Fenton Pages 71-72 Poetry Glenn Hubbard Pages 73-74 Flash Fiction E.G

Editors’ Welcome

Hello readers and welcome to issue 12 ‘Discovery’.

We are delighted to showcase the shortlisted and winning pieces from this year’s FORTY WORDS Competition in this issue.

The standard was extremely high and the shortlisted poems are both cleverly and intelligently written. They are all succinct and impactful, which made the task of choosing two winners very difficult.

We are delighted to reveal that Glenn Hubbard is this year’s winner of the poetry section with his poem ‘Thirlage’; while Delilah Doe takes first place in the fiction section with ‘Dreamcatcher’. Both pieces caught us for different reasons, but ultimately, they were pieces that we wanted to return to again, and again – each time, taking more from them.

Huge congratulations to both Glenn and Delilah, and to all those placed and shortlisted out of several hundred entries.

In addition, we have an excellent selection of writing from members of Women Aloud N.I. This feature highlights both the talent and the diversity within the group, and we hope that you enjoy every piece as much as we did.

And of course, not to forget the fantastic poetry, flash fiction, artwork and photography on offer by our contributors from all parts of the globe. These pieces were selected from hundreds of submissions on the theme of ‘DISCOVERY’, taking the theme and exploring it in a multitude of ways.

The cover artwork is a collagraph by Alice Wyatt. This piece ‘The mermaid and the dusky moon’ is part of her new collection which will be on display at Seacourt Print Workshop in Bangor from October 2020.

If you haven’t already, then go to our youtube channel and watch the’ 40 WORDS Competition Winners 2020’ video, where you can hear all of the shortlisted writers reading their pieces. (You will find the link on our website and social media pages)

Contributors have also shared readings of their pieces widely on both Facebook and Twitter, so do look out for those too.

Take care and we both hope to see you all soon!

Amy and Paul

Contents

Pages 4-44 Feature FORTY WORDS Page 45 Photography Yvonne Boyle Pages 46-62 Feature WOMEN ALOUD N. I. Pages 63-64 Painting Catherine Mc Gagh Pages 65-66 Poetry Iain Campbell Pages 67-68 Flash Fiction Mandira Pattnaik Pages 69-70 Poetry Billy Fenton Pages 71-72 Poetry Glenn Hubbard Pages 73-74 Flash Fiction E.G. Regan Page 75 Photography John Winder Pages 76-77 Poetry Phil Wood Pages 78-79 Poetry Angela Graham Pages 80-81 Photography Roger Leege Pages 82-83 Poetry Jo Angela Edwins Pages 84-85 Poetry Mary Redman Pages 86-87 Poetry Douglas Macdonald Pages 88-89 Flash Fiction Paul Gray Pages 90-91 Poetry Paula Bonnell Pages 92-93 Poetry Ray Givans Pages 94-95 Poetry Shannon Cuthbert Pages 96-97 Flash Fiction Marilyn Timms Pages 98-99 Flash Fiction Maddy Hoffman Pages 100-101 Collagraph Alice Wyatt Pages 102-103 Information The Bangor Poetry Competition

The 40 Words Competition 2020 Winners

Read the ten shortlisted FORTY WORDS poems and ten shortlisted FORTY WORDS fiction pieces, including this year’s winners.

Poetry Winner Glenn Hubbard

Glenn Hubbard lives in Madrid. He has been writing poems since 2013 and his work has been published in a number of print and online magazines. At the time of writing, he has been in lockdown for seven weeks.

Thirlage

The quern-stones stood behind the house, the wee’uns in line there, on fine days, taking turns to mill the bere barley for bannocks. Until the laird and his men came to break them, we being in defiance of thirlage.

By Glenn Hubbard

Poetry Runner Up Geraldine O’Kane

Geraldine O’Kane is a poet, creative writing facilitator, and mental health advocate. She gave a Talk for TEDx Belfast in 2015 on how creativity helps mental health. She was a recipient of the Artist Career Enhancement Scheme (ACES) 2015/16 from the Arts Council of Northern Ireland. Her collection Unsafe is forthcoming from Salmon Poetry.

Bandage

I used to bite nails until they turned sceptic huge bandages covered seven-year-old fingers mum's eczema hands dad's ulcerated legs years of our lives spent winding and unravelling.

By Geraldine O’Kane

Poetry Highly Commended Michael Farry

Michael Farry’s latest poetry collection, Troubles (2020), is published by Revival Press, Limerick. Previous collections were Asking for Directions, (Doghouse, 2012) and The Age of Glass, (Revival, 2017). He has published widely on the history of the Irish war of independence and civil war. More at http://michaelfarry.blogspot.com/

Cinquain

Today the fear of storms is less, the wind a friend to those who love the world ungroomed like me

by Michael Farry

Poetry Highly Commended Gavan Duffy

Gavan Duffy writes poetry and short fiction. he is a member of the Scurrilous Salon writers group and had previously published in, The Stinging Fly, Poetry Ireland Review, Crannog, Stony Thursday Book, New Irish Writing, Skylight 47, Boyne Berries, South Bank Poetry Journal among others. He was shortlisted for a Hennessy Award in Emerging Poetry 2015.

Guardians

He holds my pen in his teeth, like a dog fetching a stick. Uses his own to sign my name.

She feeds me peanuts from the palm of her hand, like I am the pony she always wanted. Nobody speaks.

By Gavan Duffy

Poetry Commended Elizabeth Gibson

Elizabeth Gibson is a Manchester poet and performer, and a graduate of The Writing Squad. She has won a Northern Writers’ Award, placed Second in the Poetry Society’s Timothy Corsellis Prize, and been shortlisted for the Poetry Business’ New Poets Prize. Her writing has appeared in Antiphon, Atrium, Cake, The Cardiff Review, The Compass, Confingo, Litro and Strix. She edits Foxglove Journal and can be found on Twitter and Instagram as @Grizonne.

Stars

On post-it notes, I set tiny goals, award colourful stars like a child. Ten stars, I allow myself a book, usually a comic or poems. I leave my flat in the sky, go down to collect my box of light.

By Elizabeth Gibson

Poetry Shortlist Gifford Savage

Gifford Savage is a Lay Reader in the Church of Ireland based at Bangor Abbey. When not preparing and delivering sermons to a captive audience he dabbles at writing and photography. Lagan Online used one of his poems in ‘The Power of Words: Poems for Holocaust Memorial Day 2018’, he was short-listed for the Bangor Poetry Competition 2018, and received a ‘commended’ award for his entry for the Open House Festival 40 Words Poetry Competition 2019. His poem ‘Last Lap’ appeared in Issue 11 of the Bangor Literary Journal. One of his pieces was included in the ‘Bangor’s Ghost’ exhibition in North Down Museum in June/July 2019. He has read at events throughout Northern Ireland. His photographs have appeared in a number of newspapers and magazines, most recently in the April 2020 edition of Road Racing Ireland. Gifford’s photographs have also appeared in The Bangor Literary Journal and number of his images were included in ‘The Church of Ireland , An illustrated history’, published by Booklink in 2013.

Memento Mori

Three names incised in granite. George, Sarah-Jane, Mary: 5, 4, 2 years old, May to July 1880. In those days’ parents were fraught with fear. Now it is our elders who keep us awake at night.

By Gifford Savage

Poetry Shortlist Delilah Doe

I am from Coleraine in Northern Ireland, a computer scientist by day and writer by night. I have had short stories and poems accepted online, but all the ones I have submitted are unpublished.

Fitting an entire story into 40 words has taught me to pack a punch and leave the reader wanting more. I think it’s a great discipline, teaching any writer to strip their writing down to the bare necessities (as the song goes!).

Rainwater

Sometimes the sea is a Labrador, with a sloppy tongue

Sometimes a dying swan at the feet of a lover, unsung

Today she undressed wearing linen and lace

Kissing salted rainwater from my heart and my face

By Delilah Doe

Poetry Shortlist James Milliken

James Milliken grew up in Bangor, Co Down but lived much of his adult life in the Shetland Islands. He currently lives near Ballycastle, Co Antrim. His poems have appeared in The New Shetlander, Shetland Life, and the Community Arts Partnership anthologies. He has been shortlisted twice for the Seamus Heaney Poetry Award; in 2018 for his poem “Mercy killing” and in 2020 for his poem “Lichen”.

Colloquy

We never needed much conversation, just sharing time, space, sufficed, wandering lanes and mountain ways, seeking the heart of the wilderness, calling out names of loughs, hills, like we were the first two giving a primeval landscape form, meaning.

By James Milliken

Poetry Shortlist Maurice Devitt

Winner of the Trocaire/Poetry Ireland and Poems for Patience competitions, he has been nominated for Pushcart, Forward and Best of the Net Prizes and been runner-up in the Cuirt New Writing Prize, Interpreter’s House Poetry Competition and the Cork Literary Review Manuscript Competition. He published his debut collection ‘Growing Up in Colour’ with Doire Press

Saturday Night

In the supermarket he buys flowers and the dinner special for two, including a bottle of wine.

At home, he settles the flowers in a vase, pours a first drink and puts one serving of food away until tomorrow.

By Maurice Devitt

Poetry Shortlist Bríd McGinley

Bríd McGinley is a writer from Co. Donegal in Ireland. A latecomer to writing, her fiction has appeared in The Bangor Literary Journal, Sonder Magazine, The Honest Ulsterman, The Bramley and FlashFlood 2020. @BridMcG

Walking on the Edge

My father believed He should walk On the outside of every path, His duty to protect, To meet danger first. I need no shield. But when a man steps To the outside, unbidden, I remember my father, Nod and smile.

By Bríd McGinley

Fiction Winner Delilah Doe

I am from Coleraine in Northern Ireland, a computer scientist by day and writer by night. I have had short stories and poems accepted online, but all the ones I have submitted are unpublished.

Dreamcatcher

My little boy is quiet, stirring his cereal. “You okay bud? Is the dreamcatcher getting those dreams?” Sleep hasn’t come easy since his mum died. “I've checked it every morning” he sighs. “It hasn't caught mummy even once.”

By Delilah Doe

Fiction Runner-Up Christina Eagles

I have been writing for some thirty years between the demands of family and work. Retirement in the beautiful Peak District, while surprisingly busy, has given me more time to write. I enjoy the challenge of conveying a full story in a minimum number of words and have had some competition success, especially with very short pieces. As yet, however, I have found no taker for the unpublished novels.

Marriage is a Promise Made to God

“A priest can forgive repented murder.” My Catholic colleague lifted his lips from mine. “But not adultery. A contract with the Lord trumps everything.” I envied him his God, who had taken from his shoulders the luxurious burden of choice.

By Christina Eagles

Fiction Highly Commended Stephen Smythe

Stephen Smythe lives in Manchester and achieved an MA in Creative Writing, from Salford University, in 2018. He was shortlisted in the Bridport Prize, Flash Fiction category, in 2017 for ‘Missed Connection’. He was also longlisted for the Bath Flash Fiction Award, in 2018, for ‘Leaving Do,’ and was published in an anthology of the Award's best writing, ‘Things left and found by the side of the road,’ later that year. He was awarded second place in The Bangor Literary Journal Mini-Fiction Competition, 2019, and his 40-word story ‘Cold Call’ was published in the Journal’s August edition of that year. His 3,000-word short story, ‘Marion, Me and The Vasectomy’, was published by Comma Press, in July 2020.

Sharing the Load

The others on the building site called him ‘Blister,’ because he always turned up after the work was done. Eventually, he was summoned to a disciplinary hearing. He overslept and in his place a bricklayer was given a final warning.

By Stephen Smythe

Fiction Highly Commended Kieran McGurk

Kieran Mc Gurk was the NI winner of The Great British Write Off in 2015. He has had five flash fiction pieces published in the last two editions of The Bramley, poetry in the last three CAPARTS anthologies and a short story in the current issue of The Blue Nib. He read at the John Hewitt Festival in 2019 and at many events in Tyrone and Armagh.

History Boots

I see milky-ways, drifts from last year’s paint spray, silver-white on black. There are laugh- lines where the steel ends, a scar from barbed wire. The tiniest green speckles are new life, laying low between the signal reds. My history boots.

By Kieran McGurk

Fiction Commended Lesley Walsh

Lesley Walsh is the author of the first instalment of a mystery trilogy for children and a novel of contemporary fiction underway. A Masters graduate of the Seamus Heaney Centre, QUB, one of her stories written for her course was runner-up in an international competition. She has had two short stories published in books and a number of others in literary journals.

Georgie

Georgie wilted on broken shards; his marriage, glassen. His fingertips found livid abrasions as the earthquake vanquished him, uxorial intent fulfilled. The ‘Most Likely to Succeed’ trophy engraved with his name assaulted his brow, ensuring a life extinct, by twists.

By Lesley Walsh

Fiction Shortlist Chandrika Narayanan-Mohan

Chandrika Narayanan-Mohan is a Dublin-based arts manager and writer from India, who has also lived in North America, Sweden, Turkey, and the UK. She has been featured on The Moth and Mortified podcasts, with work aired on NPR and Irish radio. She also regularly performs at literary and cabaret events in Ireland. Chandrika was selected for the Irish Writers Centre XBorders programmes in 2018 and 2020. Chandrika’s poetry is included in Writing Home: The ‘New Irish’ Poets from Dedalus Press, and was recently published in The Honest Ulsterman. Chandrika is currently guest editor of Trumpet, Poetry Ireland’s literary pamphlet. Twitter: @ChandrikaNM Instagram: @Chandrikanm.art

Too Soon

My friend’s cat died.

I watched the frenzied, roiling waves of grief crash across her, like an ocean storm. In that white-hot panicked state, a replacement was acquired.

This one’s deaf; it can’t hear the roar of its own inadequacy.

By Chandrika Narayanan-Mohan

Fiction Shortlisted Jack Macartney

Jack is an amateur writer and professional layabout. He enjoys dabbling in all things worthwhile, with an unwavering commitment to finding a way in which to fail spectacularly. He currently resides in the sticks of Oxfordshire.

Allotment

The rain had passed. Worms fought upward to the surface of soil, turned many Sundays ago. The man would never come again. Yet, every morning, the robin visited. Stopping on his spade handle; that favourite perch, their conversation left unfinished.

By Jack Macartney

Fiction Shortlist Joyce Janes

I love to write and have written eleven novels in total along with hundreds of short stories for children aged 8 to 13. These include two murder stories, with a follow up about the incompetent detective, a WW2 adventure and a ghost story with roots in the past when children were forced to work in the mills in Derbyshire. I live in the beautiful Peak District countryside, which is a fantastic inspiration for many of my stories.

An active member of two writers groups I have been instrumental in producing and promoting various books. Writers in the Peak is a very active group and we have held reading events locally, run courses and, for a year, a group for young writers. I also wrote and produced a short play in the Buxton Fringe 2019. This year Writers in the Peak are taking part reading short excerpts of our work.

The Passage of Time

She saw them, was shocked they looked so old. They’d spent exhausting years trying to find her, disappointment and despair when they didn’t. Head down she held out the paper cup. They passed, never realising how close they had been.

By Joyce Janes

Fiction Shortlist Sue Divin

Sue is a Derry based writer with Armagh roots. Her short stories, flash fiction and poetry, have been published in The Caterpillar, ‘Her Other Language’ anthology, ‘North Star’ anthology, Honest Ulsterman, The Bangor Literary Journal, Splonk, North West Words and The Bramley. Her début novel, Guard Your Heart, will be published by Macmillan in 2021.Thankful recipient of Arts Council NI SIAP award, she tweets @absolutelywrite

On meeting Mrs Chelsea Cunningham MBE.

‘Glorious, this abundance of time.’ I nod. Swallow. ‘Aren’t you furloughed?’ ‘No.’ Buzz. Ryan texts. Stuck wi algebra. ‘Heroic, our NHS.’ Johnny gurns. Lisa tugs my ankle. Shriiiiing. Work mobile. ‘Heroic.’ I agree, hiding the bag from the foodbank.

By Sue Divin

Fiction Shortlist Conor Montague

Conor Montague is an Irish writer working in London. A graduate of the MA in Writing at the National University of Ireland Galway, he has published in short fiction, creative non-fiction and academia. Recent publications include; Galway Stories (Doire Press) Watching My Hands at Work (Salmon) and Noir by Noir West (Arlen House) Shooter Literary Magazine, Sixteen Magazine and Flash Fiction Magazine. Conor’s fiction has been shortlisted/placed in a number of competitions, most recently with Reflex Fiction, Flash 500, TSS Flash 400, London Independent Story Prize, The Writers Bureau Short Story Comp 2019, Bray Literary Festival Flash Fiction Comp 2019. He had two stories shortlisted for The Bridport Prize 2019.

The First Question I Asked When My Father Died

We sit in the charged post-death silence, searching for words worthy of the moment. Eunice fingers rosary beads, poised. Maureen stares. Des checks his watch. Checks it again. Alma gulps down sobs. I stand. ‘Anyone fancy a cup of tea?’

By Conor Montague

Photography Yvonne Boyle

Leaf with droplets

Yvonne Boyle has had a range of poems published in a variety of magazines, books and online anthologies. She also enjoys taking photographs and has had a number displayed at the Blackberry Path Art Studios, Bangor and included in the Bangor Literary Journal.

During lockdown I spent more time in my garden. One morning after a shower, I found this leaf with water droplets on it.

Feature

Women Aloud N. I.

Women Aloud NI ,a collective of women writers from across Northern Ireland. Founded in 2016,it aims to support, promote and raise the profile of women writers across Northern Ireland.

‘North Star’ is available to purchase at ‘The Secret Bookshelf’, ‘No Alibis’ and on Amazon.

On Hearing Roger Robinson Read ‘A Portable Paradise’.

That afternoon in Brixton I was looking out the window at work down past St Matthew’s Meeting Place and the High Street.

The same window I leaned out of the day of the Brixton riots and I could see above buildings in the distance the smoke rising.

But this afternoon it was sunny and I thought I want to remember this. Today I am happy here.

The diagram I drew of how I saw my life could go had two parallel lines, one London, one Ulster.

Either was possible Either would do. I choose Ulster.

By Yvonne Boyle

Yvonne Boyle has had a range of poems and short stories published in a variety of magazines, books and online anthologies. She was an NI Arts Council Support for the Individual Artist (SIAP) Awardee 2018/9. This year she had a poem included in the WomenAloudNI lockdown Anthology ‘North Star’.

Painted Lady

There you were on an old grey vest I wear underneath more presentables.

I took the other washing in but left you undisturbed; wings shut, asleep maybe.

I thought you were a moth at first, brightness undisclosed, hidden in the folds of my old grey vest.

In the morning you were gone, your colours on display for someone else.

I kept a photograph.

By Laura Cameron

Laura Cameron’s poems have appeared in various publications, including The Bangor Literary Journal. Her poem ‘Selfie’ was Commended in the Bangor Poetry Competition, 2018 and ‘Still’ was placed 4th in The Bangor Poetry Competition, 2019. Her poem, ‘Breaking Bread’, was recently published on Pendemic.

Ocean

This ocean humiliating in its disguise, You bullied me for most of my life, You took away the trust, You tried to shape my identity.

You lied to me, That you have done all my life, A line from another story, I mention a hero, Pink is my colour of love.

By Alison Black

Alison Black is a male to female transgendered person. She is a writer from Belfast and identifies herself as female. Alison is a member of Women Aloud N.I. She likes to write from the heart and she has been lucky to have had some poems published, which has made her happy.

Dinner After the Writing Festival

You’re writing is simply exquisite (he takes a slobbery draw from his plump Havana)

Oh, you say all the right things (she digs her nails into the flesh of her neck)

I think your recent draft has a lot of potential, but we would need to rewrite the start, it needs a stronger hook but then… (he takes a gulp of prosecco and tops up her glass)

But the protagonist is strong from the start (she takes a sip)

Mmmm but there needs to be fragility at the start in order to get the readers sympathy. I’m about to publish my hundredth book. I know all there is to know. You haven’t drank your wine, my dear (he puts a hand on the table)

But its important… (she takes her hand off the table)

Listen to me, I can get you a big five contract (he widens his legs, extends the right and taps her toe)

But my integrity… (she crosses her legs)

Finish your wine, I have a room, we should discuss it further there

I have a lot of ideas about how I can maintain the veracity of her character and improve the opening chapter (she downs her glass in one)

That’s good dear, bring them upstairs (he throws a wad of dollars on the table and stands tall).

By Gaynor Kane

Gaynor Kane is a poet from Belfast. She has two poetry pamphlets, and a full collection forthcoming, from Hedgehog Poetry Press. They are: Circling the Sun, Memory Forest and Venus in pink marble (2018, 2019 and September 2020 respectively). Follow her on Twitter @gaynorkane or read more at www.gaynorkane.com.

Out of My Mind

There are times when I picture myself back in secondary school English, lying into the heat of the high radiator, ignoring the monotone drone as I stare out the window to grasp any life outside of this tedium.

Every Tuesday, he was there in full stride — Mr. Walks-Around-The-House. In my mind, I cheered on his laps — twenty-five, before I was knocked off my tally, caught by the teacher as I watched the old man on the verge of his life, and me, on the edge of English.

When Mr Walks-Around died, my uncle bought The-House. On visits, when the elders settled into the chat, I’d stare out the living-room window — ready to cheer when Mr Walks-Around-The-House strode past.

By Trish Bennett

Trish Bennett writes about and the shenanigans of her family, and other creatures. She’s won or been placed in over a dozen poetry competitions. Bennett’s performed at events in Ireland and the UK including Cúirt, North West Words, RTÉ, and BBC Radio Ulster. In 2019, Bennett’s micro-pamphlet, Borderlines, was published by Hedgehog Poetry Press, and she received a SIAP Award from The Arts Council of Northern Ireland. Blog:https://trishbennettblog.wordpress.com Twitter/Instagram: @baabennett Fac ebook: trishbennettwriter

Out of Control

The announcement at the airport in Atlanta, Georgia was loud and clear: "Please maintain control of your bags at all times."

Glancing at my Asda handbag, I couldn't imagine it misbehaving. An endless stream of travellers and airport staff flowed by; a vast variety of people, each carrying, or wheeling, some sort of bag.

A tall woman tapped slowly by on high heels, her clothes and makeup immaculate, a designer handbag on her shoulder. Snap! went the alligator bag. Snap, Snap! The woman looked peeved and gripped the bag tightly, hitching it higher on her shoulder.

A dad pulled the lead of a wheeled dog-shaped case, on which rode his small son. Suddenly, the doggy case dashed out from under the child, the lead slipping from the man's hand. It barked and jumped up on a little girl wearing a kitten backpack, which wriggled off the child's shoulders and hid cowering under a seat.

A deep moo issued from the wide-brimmed leather cowboy hat on the head of a man who was passing; his boots joined in.

A snakeskin belt slithered from the waist of another traveller to join the melee.

A swarthy gentleman, whose case sported colourful parrots, was startled by the ascent of the birds over his head, with much squawking and scattering of blue and green feathers.

An older lady found the wool from her crochet bag bleating and forming itself into lassoes to catch the rampant animals. Another announcement rang out: "Last call for Delta Flight 1703 to Cleveland. Will passengers please make their way to gate B24. And for goodness sake, get a grip on your belongings!"

One by one the parrots, the dog, the kitten, the sheep, the cows, and the snakeskin belt were reined in.

Smiling, I made my way to my departure gate.

By Linda Hutchinson

Linda Hutchinson is proud to call herself a member of Women Aloud. Since she joined three years ago, she has made friends, received encouragement and support for her writing and enjoyed reading and listening to other women's work. Linda writes flash fiction and novels for children.

The Bathroom Window, Reid Street, East Belfast, 1965

WHO do you think you are? I am a child in a white enamel bath, my back to the taps, my feet beneath the boards the Baby Burco Boiler sits on. Who DO you think you are? I have a Daddy who roofed in the strip of yard from scullery to toilet, walled it off, put in the bath and sink and plumbed cold water. Who do YOU think you are? I am a herder of flamingos across a savannah as shiny-black as a lacquer box. Shockingly pink, they skirt the glassy lake. Who do you THINK you are? I boil the coiling sheets in the Baby Burco, a scalding cauldron. Mammy wrestles the dragon into the pit for me to tread on. Who do you think YOU are? I am a trampler-out of vintage, singing to my wall of flamingos, Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord. He’s coming! Who do you think you ARE? I have a Mammy whose wrists can torque a sheet to wring it dead. She has taught me how to launder. I can tackle anything. And you …?

By Angela Graham

Angela Graham’s poetry has appeared in The Bangor Literary Journal, The North, The Honest Ulsterman, The Interpreter’s House, The Ogham Stone, The Open Ear, Poetry in Motion Anthology 2020, North Star, The Blue Nib and elsewhere, and imminently in Places of Poetry, The Lonely Crowd and The Stony Thursday Book.

Outside

I am two fingers to the world but when I go outside I find my hand turning palm cupped and my lips curl for what I get.

I want to jump to the stars when I go outside its fare and a half or I can’t get a taxi my wheelchair blamed I smile but don’t tell my eyes.

I see you freeze and stumble tumbling over the right words to say words hurt but its worse when you stay silent I grin with clenched teeth.

I laugh, really, when you show me the new accessible loo you are so proud as you open the door a mop falls out oh how I laugh. But not from the belly.

By Anita Gracey

Anita Gracey has been published in Bangor Literary Journal, Poetry Ireland Review, Washing Windows – Irish Women Write Poetry (Ed. Eavan Boland), North Star (ed. Woman Aloud), Abridged, The Poets Republic, The Honest Ulsterman, Poetry NI, The Blue Nib, Culture Matters, Sonder, Domestic Violence Anthology, CAP Anthologies, Sonder and Pendemic. Her work has featured in The Poetry Jukebox. She was shortlisted Over the Edge New Writer of the Year 2018, longlisted for the Hennessy New Irish Writing in 2019 and shortlisted Chultúrlann Poetry Competition 2020.Anita is supported by an iDA award, managed by the University of Atypical on behalf of the Arts Council of Northern Ireland. 54

Captain Dundee

Captain Divine, our work is now complete And ere we part, we gather at thy feet To give our labours and ourselves to Thee Without reserve, Thy cause to serve O Captain hear us as we pledge to be True to our creed in thoughts and deeds Amen.

Girls’ Brigade Vesper

I think of you, my captain, in a gym hall, upright — mast bending to the wind — cartwheeling across the polished timber floors of the Craigyhill Presbyterian Girls’ Brigade.

I feared you, my captain, addressing a squad, uptight — silver buttons clasped over angular chest — starboard chasing aspirations not yet formed by Explorers in navy tunics and red, woollen jumpers.

I watched you, my captain — imperious head heralded upwards two-three — leading white guttied Juniors in arrow formation with a lunge, heel-toe and pas de Basque to ‘The Sailor’s Hornpipe.’

I questioned you, my captain, your rigid corps upstanding in a church hall — sight monocular — inspecting skinny arms and legs by soap-filled plastic basins at annual camp in Douglas.

I heard you, my captain, your counsel in the Antrim Hills humorously uplifting — voice clearing fog, yet soft against nylon — confessing to captive Seniors that you had been tempted by sherry at a dance in the 1950s.

I saluted you, my captain, in the Mournes sailing up mountains — body clean from cancer, for now — clamoring Christian-like to find lost Duke of Edinburgh Gold Brigaders two days after a double mastectomy.

I think of you, my captain, cartwheeling starboard, hauling us up to uncharted places — with clean hands and turned out toes. Your work is now complete.

By Angeline King

Angeline King, Writer in Residence of Ulster University from September 2020, is author of contemporary novels Snugville Street (2015) and A Belfast Tale (2016). Angeline was selected as one of Libraries NI three emerging authors of 2017 and received the Arts Council of Northern Ireland to write her latest novel, Dusty Bluebells. Angeline also writes poetry, history and literary essays.

Imprisoned

He was alone.

They left him alone now for what felt like days. The candle at the door always burned so high and bright when it was first lit, but gradually shrank and dimmed as it burned low. The wax left a trail down the stone wall, thick white streaks that glistened as they hardened. And just before the wick guttered out, the candle would be replaced and the cycle would start again.

This deep in the dungeons, the air was still and cold. It tasted of damp, mould and rotten things. It chilled him down to the bone as it wrapped around him, promising nothing but day after day of emptiness. With not even a breeze to stir it, it clung to his skin.

Water ran down the wall, a thin stream that made no sound as it obeyed gravity and pooled in a hollowed out stone of the floor. It was sweet and clean, and all that he had to keep himself alive. A hole in the opposite corner took care of his own waste, thankfully whisking it away.

He existed.

They left food at every other change of the candle. Warn black bread, a charred leg of fowl and a handful of barely stewed vegetables. For dungeon fare, it seemed like a feast, but every time the plate appeared, his heart sank. They wanted something from him, and as yet, he didn't know what that was.

He sat on the rickety wooden pallet that served as a bed, the ragged remnants of his coat pulled around him as he tried to focus his mind on the thought of escape. But it was nothing more than a fantasy to keep him warm during the dark watches of the night. For no one who went into the Empress's dungeons ever came out again.

There had been no trial, no words spoken in his own defence. He had been taken, and was judged on the fact that he had been taken. If he had not been guilty, or so the whispers told him, then the guards would not have turned their steps in his direction.

The candle dimmed, and went out. He raised his head, listening for the sound of the footsteps of his jailers.

They weren't coming.

He was alone in the darkness.

We have a job for you the shadows whispered.

By Elizabeth McQuillan

Born in England, raised in Scotland and now living in Northern Ireland with her husband and space-mad child, Elizabeth McQuillan has dabbled her toes into the waters of self- publishing. She also has short stories published in the Alien Days anthology by Castrum Press, and the North Star Women Aloud anthology.

The Maine Man

Staring at crates armed with bottles, I felt lucky.

It was Friday and the Maine man had arrived.

Imagine a truck that clinked on every corner, each bump alive with acidic greens, magentas, bottle browns and bubble-gum blues.

For me, each time it was cloudy lime. But we got brown lemonade and pineapple-aid and American soda too (for the Maine man wouldn’t be round the estate again until next week).

But what would I do today, if the Maine man called my way? Would I send my son outside to choose his weekly stash; or worry, much to his dismay, about decay; fear him to be keyed up on colour all that day.

Listen to the sadness of the world we’re in – when the things without thought we once consumed, are now saccharine, sickly and nothing more than memories.

By Amy Louise Wyatt

Amy Louise Wyatt is a poet, artist and lecturer from Bangor, Northern Ireland. Her work is published in a range of Irish and international journals. Amy was shortlisted for the Seamus Heaney Award 2018 and 2020 and The Dempsey and Windle National Poetry Day Competition 2019. She was a finalist in The National Funeral Services Poetry Competition in 2017; and was nominated for 2019 Best of Net. Amy won the inaugural Poetrygram Prize, 2019. She is the founding editor of The Bangor Literary Journal. Her debut poetry pamphlet ‘A Language I Understand’ is forthcoming in late 2020 with Indigo Dreams. https://amylouisewyatt.com/

Heartburst Hill

I take you to feed the ducks in the park Here sunbursts of shape know just what to do You are my reflector of light and dark

We both gather around the watermark Without thought you mouth the bread I give you I take you to feed the ducks in the park

Light fragments on the water, I remark The lake and the sky are clear mirrors too You are my reflector of light and dark

Each tree is an open book to be scarred Each flower is crocheted with fingermarks I take you to feed the ducks in the park

You make snowflakes of leaves then disembark To the shuffling geese you wouldn’t say boo You are my reflector of light and dark

Here your kaleidoscopic symmetry sparks into the pink, purple, the green and blue I take you to feed the ducks in the park You are my reflector of light and dark

By Kelly Creighton

Kelly Creighton lives in Co. Down and facilitates creative writing classes for community groups and schools. For five years she curated The Incubator literary journal. Her published books include The Bones of It, Bank Holiday Hurricane, The Sleeping Season. Problems with Girls will be released in November 2020.

Stay Home

Spring is here and I must stay home. This blue, silent sky does not match my mood. A plane above breaks the blackbird’s song also the tune of the gentle rustle of the beech tree. I hope it is a mercy plane returning lovers, mother, fathers. I fill the large grey watering can to its brim knowing it will hurt these arthritic hands. I need to shift the pain “stay home” created. Later I ring my family in another land. I want to say come home here, to your first home. Instead I tell you to stay in your home. I tell of the new born socks I posted. Innocent and white. Slipped into my trolley of essentials. I see how the baby in her belly has grown. My mood lifts. I do not mention my tears which fell on pea shoots and beets when I watered them earlier this day.

By Wilma Kenny

Wilma Kenny graduated from Queen’s University in 1978 with a degree in English and Psychology. Her poetry and short stories have been published. Wilma has worked as a freelance journalist. In 2014 she was joint runner up in the Trocaire and Poetry Ireland poetry competition and was 2nd in Carers UK creative writing competition (poetry section) 2014. She was published in the recent anthology Washing Windows published by Arlen House and in 2016 had a short story published in the London Journal of Fiction. More recently in 2018 she has been published in The Open Ear and Answer the Call (Whiskey and Words).

Florence

I searched for you, willing the nineteenth century Kerry Parish Records to yield up its secrets. And there you were, in thick black ink, Florence, a foreign name on an Irish register. An Irish, Welsh, English child, this enigma, this Protestant birth in a Catholic country. I can see you in your roughly made wooden crib mewling by the heat of the metal range, the Church of Ireland minister going through the baptism ritual for a sickly baby not going to live. Your siblings stand sadly by your crib, a much wanted playmate and sister, your mother silent and resigned, your father absent in search of work. But as you thrust your tiny translucent fist towards the nurturing heat in protest it was clear that you were going to see all of them down! And so on to Belfast to a twentieth century Irish woman in a Protestant town, culturing your accent, but proudly strutting down the avenue, tall and strong in your fox fur stole, your feathered hat blowing carefree in the gentle breeze. From a bold name in a Co. Kerry Parish Register, to Belfast, you were always going to make your mark: You were always going to make waves.

By Meg McCleery

Former College lecturer in English Literature and Media Meg McCleery also ran Creative Writing classes in Belfast Community Centres and Women’s Centres. She was awarded third place at the 7th Bangor Poetry Competition 2019 and has had work published in various journals and books including “North Star” in May 2020. Originally from Belfast Meg now lives in North Down.

Painting Catherine Mc Gagh

Into Wonderland

Oils on Canvas

This painting emerged after a healing journey based on the story of Alice in Wonderland.Healer Marie Evans from Lurganboy,Co. Leitrim invited a group of like minded people to journey down the rabbit hole beyond what is expected of us,retrieving the lost parts of ourselves in a playful,magical,deeply spiritual way.

Catherine Mc Gagh is a yoga teacher & artist from Kinlough,Co.Leitrim.She works mainly with oils on canvas & charcoal on paper.At present she works out of a studio in the Leitrim Sculpture Centre. ‘Taking time to paint & draw nutures a space that provides stability & connection in my life.It helps me to access a meditative state of mind..’ 63

Painting Catherine Mc Gagh

Meditation Oils on Canvas

This painting is a reflection of the inner landscape that one discovers from meditation & contemplation.

Most recently Catherine was a contributor to the We’Moon 2020 & 2018 diary(Gaia Rhythms & lunar calendar for Women);’Stay with Me’ art exhibition in honour of children who died in the care of religious orders,Inspire art Gallery,Dublin & University College Cork 2019. She had her first solo show at ArtCo Gallery in Letterkenny in April 2016 and has exhibited more recently in group shows in Hambly & Hambly,Dunbar House,Enniskillen,Leitrim Sculpture Centre,Boyle arts festival,the Dock,Carrick on Shannon,Co.Leitrim & High Bridges Gallery,Enniskillen,Co Fermanagh. 64

Poetry Iain Campbell

Iain Campbell is an engineer, gardener, sailor, Papa and poet. He has been a regular entrant to the Bangor Poetry Competition, runner up in 2014 and commended in 2018. He has read at the Open House and Aspects Literary Festivals and has had work published in The Blue Nib, The Honest Ulsterman, Lagan Online and The Bangor Literary Journal.

Miyoka's shadow

August's sun crept in stealth across the eastern horizon, a swelling, angry ball of fire, painting the clouds purpled pink, bathing the houses in a prophetic glow and stencilling cherry tree shadows against their terracotta walls.

Miyoko had woken early; now she slipped on her wooden sandals, stepped quietly into her street and latched the garden gate. It was just past eight; school friends would be waiting by the bridge, and she was never late.

The Ota delta shone like silver, high tide lapped the inshore barges; the ferryman drifted downstream, aiming for centre of the crossing; a lavender breeze chased ripples across the flat calm water.

The summer's quiet morning sky was a perfect cornflower blue, wrapped with shredded wisps of cirrus.

"Altitude 31,060 feet: check. Speed 200 knots: check. Aim point: visual acquired. All crew, on glasses. Commencing bomb run."

Enola Gay was only four minutes out; only four minutes from Aioi bridge.

On 6th August 1945, at 0816 local time, an atomic bomb exploded over Hiroshima.

Miyoka's mother later found her daughter's left sandal; just her sandal, beside her shadow, etched pale upon the ground.

By Iain Campbell

Flash Fiction Mandira Pattnaik

Mandira Pattnaik's recent works have appeared in Citron Review, Gasher, Splonk, Panoplyzine and Spelk among others.Tweets are at @MandiraPattnaik.

Caged

An elephant herd marches to the sanctuary gates along the huge moat covered in hyacinths, around the steel railings at the entry gates, peers over the boundary wall looking for people. ‘WE’RE CLOSED’, the sign at the gates is fifty days old. Nobody’s been around here; no honking cars, no excited children, no adults behaving like kids. The herd turns back. Back along the casuarinas swaying in the breeze. ‘Mummy!’ This elephant calf has never seen a human, born after the virus’ conquests. She huddles beneath her mother and points to someone walking up the ridge. ‘That’s him, our mahout!’ The herd begins to trumpet. The sounds launch across the wilderness, and the man waves back. They scramble to get closer to him. The man runs as fast as his legs can carry, flings both arms around the tiniest, and in that instant, discovers more love than a lifetime.

By Mandira Pattnaik

Poetry Billy Fenton

Billy Fenton lives outside Waterford City and he writes poetry and short stories. His work has been published in the Irish Times, Poetry Ireland Review, Crannóg, Honest Ulsterman, Galway Review and others. He was shortlisted for a Hennessy Award in 2018, and for a Write by the Sea Poetry Award in 2019. He was chosen as a mentee for the Words Ireland National Mentoring Programme in 2019.

Abandoned Car

Shiny red plastic. Black steering wheel. Pedal powered. I reached out my hand, met the coldness of glass. I want it, I said. No, they said.

On a bog road to Muckish. Car, the colour of autumn leaves, merest trace of red. I sit on its torn seat, hands on the air wheel, look through a broken windscreen.

Foraged pram wheels. Scuffed toe cap on the steering plank. Oily hands on the cord. Mai Cooney’s gate grows like the teeth of an angry Brother. My face and arms a nettled red.

I climb from my abandoned car. Clots of bog cotton open over summer heather. I slip through a plate glass window, fly over gates without the need of wings.

By Billy Fenton

Poetry Glenn Hubbard

Glenn Hubbard lives in Madrid. He has been writing poetry since 2013. Currently on holiday in Asturias, he has returned to plant hunting habits. Poetically, he owes an awful lot to the late R. F. Langley.

Wild Flowers

And so I am identifying flowers again. The mystery of the name and where it came from. You could see it as a game. An activity for the lame that puts some sort of frame around my day. It’s all the same to me. It’s a gain. I am making the world less strange. I am entering in. Bringing something else within range. Making it known to myself. Partaking of what the world contains. And I have proof. This is this I can say. A plain truth.

By Glenn Hubbard

Flash Fiction E.G. Regan

E.G. Regan is an author based in Toronto, Ontario. She is currently a student at Sheridan College in their Creative Writing and Publishing program. Grace loves to write across all genres and forms, including plays, poetry, fiction, and interactive fiction. She has previously been published by Savant Garde in their spring 2019 issue.

This is How Girls Are Meant to Be

The girl turns into a bird at night. A crow, with shiny obsidian feathers and cold marble eyes. The transformation isn’t gentle; it is a ripping, skin shedding, shrinking stunt. In it, the girl loses the gleam of humour in her eyes, the way she steps down hard with her left foot, the melody of her laugh. All she becomes is hungry.

She is a crow and crows at night are invisible, their bodies shadows among the thousand shadows of night-time. She feels reborn into the crow, into its hollow bones and viciousness. As the girl she can’t be vicious, she can’t be hungry and only want and want and want. She can’t hollow out her own bones with a teaspoon, can’t fly without some saying, “hold your wing like this, no, like this.”

But as a bird she can rip into field mice with her beak, splatter their little mice guts onto the velvet grass. She can discover this brutal part of herself, hidden under layers of this is how girls are meant to be. Some girls are meant to be crows.

By E.G. Regan

Photography John Winder

Grey Heron

Sepia toned photograph

As we rounded the path at the edge of the lake, we came across a large grey heron waiting patiently for its prey. The low level evening sunlight caused the bird to glow against the backdrop of reeds.

John Winder is a scientist and landscape/wildlife photographer. He began creative photography 40 years ago and is still surprised by the pleasure of both the act of photography and the resulting images. He enjoys the outdoors, nature and the environment.

Poetry Phil Wood

Phil Wood studied English Literature at Aberystwyth University. He has worked in statistics, shipping, and a biscuit factory. His writing can be found in various publications, most recently: Ink Sweat and Tears, London Grip, and Fly On The Wall Magazine (issue 6).

Curious

The one section twisting, the other still. I am a child again, with a trowel playing at science. Gran saying, it mends itself in time. That was her comfort myth.

I toss the halves into the long grass, dismiss those garden voices, finish digging. Fact is the tail will die, the head may live. I mend, in my mind, a broken line.

By Phil Wood

Poetry Angela Graham

Angela Graham’s poetry has appeared in The Bangor Literary Journal, The North, The Honest Ulsterman, The Interpreter’s House, Poetry Wales, The Ogham Stone, The Open Ear, Poetry in Motion Anthology 2020, North Star, Black Bough Poems, The Blue Nib and elsewhere, and imminently in Places of Poetry, The Lonely Crowd and The Stony Thursday Book. Her short story collection A City Burning is due Oct 21 from Seren Books.

Viaticum

You are a map. I eat you, Swallowing your bait, Mouthing my way along the line you trail, Drawn on.

This is a journey led by appetite Through flesh and blood. I taste you. You enter me, willingly And travel in your turn My every maze.

You have mapped me And now I know your taste (Salt sting to the tip) I will find you out On the darkest moor, Homing in By tongue On you, My road, My goal.

By Angela Graham

Photography Roger Leege

Adam and Eve

I discovered Adam and Eve in sgraffito on a much neglected plaster wall in Vienna in a random collection of other similar biblical images. Age, weather and traffic and contributed the colour and the rather contemporary-looking painterly effect.

Photography Roger Leege

Golgotha

Another image from the same Vienna location. Although it is un-tutored art and it is hard to distinguish between damage and design, it rewards accidental discovery.

Photographer, Roger Leege, (BA, MA, Visual Arts, Goddard College), draws on his past as a lawn boy, meat cutter, storyteller, trucker, EMT, poet, carpenter, bass player, painter, embalmer’s assistant, printmaker, union agitator, journalist, videographer, educator, and Florida man, to create words and pictures might slip between the cracks With post-grad study in computer science, he became an early adopter of and evangelist for small computers and digital artist's tools.

Poetry Jo Angela Edwins

Jo Angela Edwins has published poems in various venues including Calyx, Zone 3, The A3 Review, Whale Road Review, and New South. Her chapbook Play was published in 2016 by Finishing Line Press. She has received awards from Winning Writers, Poetry Super Highway, and the South Carolina Academy of Authors and is a Pushcart Prize, Forward Prize, and Bettering American Poetry nominee. She is the poet laureate of the Pee Dee region of South Carolina and teaches literature and writing at Francis Marion University in Florence, SC.

Broken Sonnet

My former student sits beside her mother’s shadowed hospital bed. An online plea for help has led me down this corridor, blank and wide enough for gurneys side by side to pass. I carry coffee, fresh bread, fruit and cheese and my already read magazines. The daughter, bleary-eyed, rises from the vinyl chair, stretches her arms to greet me. Flash back to when I’ve sat alone beside a loved one, worried my care wasn’t enough. In truth, my own old griefs, much more than kindness, push my feet down this hall, indifferent and bare.

By Jo Angela Edwins

Poetry Mary Redman

Mary Redman is a retired high school English teacher who currently works part time supervising student teachers for University of Indianapolis and volunteers as a docent at IMA at Newfields. She has had poems published in Flying Island, Tipton Poetry Journal, Snapdragon: a Journal of Healing, and elsewhere, and will soon be published in Nine Cloud and So It Goes. One of her poems received a Pushcart nomination in 2019.

As I Go

I let the squawk and din of the day slide from my shoulders like a jacket peeled, too warm for a walk. This place where trains once ran hums now with insects, rustling leaves, and birds, everything alive doing and undoing the day. merging into one early autumn afternoon where a tunnel of golden trees invite me to be part of the fading birdsong.

By Mary Redman

Poetry Douglas Macdonald

Douglas Macdonald has published frequently in the last few years, including poems in Hayden's Ferry Review, Gargoyle, Sand Journal (Berlin), Inverted Syntax and elsewhere. Two years ago he was nominated for a Pushcart prize.

By Douglas Macdonald

Flash Fiction Paul Gray

Paul lives in Belfast. He has recently retired after working in the charity sector for over thirty years. He is interested in painting and music and is new to creative writing. He particularly enjoys the challenging succinctness of the short story and flash fiction.

Photographic Memory

A sealed brown envelope was what most intrigued him. James looked at the assembled papers which had remained, until now, in the attic since his father’s death. Photographs, certificates, a diary of his mothers, various mementos and newspaper cuttings lay on the floor. He looked blankly at many names and faces which meant nothing to him. In amongst the papers was the brown envelope. There were letters, photographs and cuttings pinned together. There was a 1950’s photograph of an RAF man. James remembered his father talking about him. He had been his father’s best friend at work before joining. He had even named James after him. The lively correspondence they shared was of girlfriends, travel and leisure time, young men eager about life. James could sense his father’s admiration for this dashing pilot and his career. There was a picture of the Hawker Hunter he flew, beautifully printed and signed by him. There were also multiple yellow faded cuttings featuring the RAF man’s photograph. Then details of the flight, the pilot he was training and the plane, his beloved Hawker Hunter, and amidst those tangled cuttings, the time, final communication and location of the site.

By Paul Gray

Poetry Paula Bonnell

Poems by Paula Bonnell have appeared in APR, Southern Poetry Review, Rattle, and many others in the U. S.as well as in journals and anthologies published in Canada, England, India and Australia. Her awards include a nomination for a 2020 Pushcart Prize, the selection of the ms. of her Airs & Voices by poet and critic Mark Jarman for a Ciardi publication prize, and an award from the New England Poetry Club for her only sestina. She has often vacationed Downeast in Maine.

Describing to my mother, who can’t quite see, a photograph in the newspaper

At the newly-reopened library, looking down the corridor formed by a pair of facing shelves of books, the photographer sees a reader searching for a book, and behind him, against the sunlit window, a chess board between a man in a plaid shirt and the hand of a player hidden by the bookshelves on the right. The photographer lifts his camera and waits, his finger resting on the shutter. Plaid shirt makes his move and waits. The reader stoops, still searching. Then on the shutter the finger squeezes Now! as the hand stretches across the chessboard, taking a piece, just as my father seizes a book from the shelf.

By Paula Bonnell

Poetry Ray Givans

Ray Givans has been published in five pamphlet length poetry collections. His first full poetry collection, "Tolstoy in Love" was published by Dedalus Press, 2009. His most recent collection, "The Innermost Room" is from Poetry Salzburg Press, at the University of Salzburg, 2017.

Unwelcome Discovery, Butlins, Bognor Regis

I was shown to an empty chalet; bunk bed, one chair. For a week I’d share that cell with a Glaswegian, his machine-gun tongue hard to decipher. First foray into Bognor I followed him into Woolworths, noted the rustle of his empty bag against the legs of his flared trousers. I watched as he negotiated a purchase: dropped two white gutties into the bag.

Back in the chalet the Scot spilled the contents: boxed set of cufflinks, jazzy glass on an alloy base; black and brown shoe and boot laces, various lengths; purple sunglasses, oval frames; knick-knacks and gimcracks. He lay back on his bunk, opened a window on his craft. Gutties: asked the assistant the price of a child’s pair, handed over adult, size 8.

(Years later I’d shiver how close I’d come to being an accomplice to the crime.) Back then, I followed him for a week, until a red coat filled me in: my roommate, bartender, was seen behind a bar counter flicking up coins into his mouth, later, out-of-view, pocketing them. He was seen off the camp’s site. The red coat mused on why I’d hung out with ‘such a loser’. My mind went back

to that first night, eighteen, first time away from my parents, standing alone in the Pig and Whistle, a band on stage, full volume, covering a song by Herb Alphert and his typhanny brass orchestra. At tables the chime of glasses, and through a warm smoke fug waves of chatter. I spoke to no one, returned to that forlorn room.

By Ray Givans

Poetry Shannon Cuthbert

Shannon Cuthbert is a writer and artist living in Brooklyn. Her poems have appeared in Collidescope, Bluepepper, and Chronogram, among others, and are forthcoming in Muddy River Poetry Review and Glass: A Journal of Poetry.

Notwithstanding

In the dollhouse cabins of a Cape Cod lodge, I was six and fell in love with open space, the unexplored edges of a small tamed terrain. My brother in diapers painted crayon monsters on the walls as my sister and I whirled like tops on green hills, Watching our hair and dresses flare out, animated as wildflowers in a wind. The bay was a dream where our fingers and thoughts cascaded along endless low-tide pools. My sister followed me on its trails of sand crabs and starfish, limbs unformed except as liquid constellations. We marked them as maps of our own design. Skirts sopping, salted skin, we grew into beasts of sand and sea. Once we wandered too far out, lulled by the mythic flatness ahead, nearly cut off from our parents behind. Once we wandered out the cabin’s back, ran and twirled with another girl who looked like us through a sullen glass. She fed us her family’s sugared cereal, showed us her brother slumped on a couch, turned the tv to forbidden channels, opened a small space I would wiggle later like loose baby teeth in my wandering mind.

By Shannon Cuthbert

Flash Fiction Marilyn Timms

Marilyn Timms, a chocoholic writer and artist living in Gloucestershire, has been widely published online and in print. Marilyn has performed her short stories at four Cheltenham Literature Festivals. Two of her comedies have reached the stage, the third lies mouldering alongside her novel.

Stoking Fires

I had never heard the word ‘sedation.’ My fingers scrabbled at Mummy’s eyelids, unearthed only the terrifying whites of eyes. I dug deeper, determined to find her. She wasn’t there. I remember my screams, the intricate scents of Father’s jacket; his thumb, blotting my tears. Mummy’s poorly, we’ll explain when you’re older! A birthday cake. Six candles extinguished in one puff! I am definitely older. A question wriggles in my chest, an imaginary caterpillar struggling in its chrysalis. Next morning, I am helping lay a fire in the lounge. Newspaper, knotted into paper pretzels; kindling, fresh from her axe, a pale pyramid on the carpet; coal, huge and glossy in the brass scuttle. Mummy shovels clinker from the grate, lays it in the bucket without causing dust. I tease ash from the corners of the hearth, accidently raise a whirlwind. A butterfly rises from chest to mouth, pauses on my lips, leaps into sound. Why were you poorly, Mummy? She doesn’t pretend to not understand. Mummy strokes my back, speaks softly. I am inflated with news, afraid I’ll burst. She explains to me how a baby could grow in her tummy and how, sometimes, he might die there.

By Marilyn Timms

Flash Fiction Maddy Hoffman

Maddy Hoffman is a Government major at the College of William & Mary. She enjoys writing flash fiction, watching trash TV, and sleeping in.

Santa Monica

Do you think a lot about Santa Monica? I know I do. The whole beach looked like one of your paintings, and our inhibitions ended where the water met the shore. I knew then that you’d be right at home in California, because the sky was the color of your name. Do you remember collecting sea glass? It felt like currency, the way it weighed our pockets down and chattered in our tote bags. Between my palms I rolled each frosted pebble, desperate to understand how the sharp edges of the ocean could create a smooth stone. Are you still finding sand in your ears, between your toes? We covered ourselves in it, trying to become one with the coast, trying to trick the tide into washing us away.

By Maddy Hoffman

Collagraph Alice Wyatt

Moonlight through the trees

Collagraph

Alice Wyatt is a printmaker and painter from Bango who has exhibited and sold her work widely throughout Ireland. In her new body of work, Alice explores both the spiritual connection to the Irish landscape and the myths surrounding it.

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Collagraph Alice Wyatt

The mermaid and the dusky moon

Collagraph

Alice is a member of Seacourt print workshop and her new exhibition can be viewed there from the beginning of October 2020.

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THE EIGHTH ANNUAL BANGOR POETRY COMPETITION IS NOW OPEN. WE ARE ACCEPTING POEMS ON THE THEME OF ‘CONNECTIONS’! https://thebangorliteraryjournal.com/the-bangor-poetry-competition/ This year will see the Bangor Poetry Competition take on a slightly new format due to the given circumstances. We are now accepting poems on the theme of ‘Connections’. You can email your poems to [email protected] with the heading ‘8th BANGOR POETRY COMPETITION- Your name’.

You can enter up to six poems per person. The submission donation for poems is as follows: One poem £4/ Three poems £10. Please pay the submission donation following the PayPal link above and include your PayPal transaction number in the body of the email. All poems must be in English and previously unpublished (they should not have been published online, in print, on social media or blogs). They should be no longer than 40 lines (not including stanza breaks) and can be in any style. (Traditional right through to experimental) Please attach your poems in a separate Word document with no trace of your name. All submissions are read anonymously by the editorial team. Please title your documents as ‘8th Bangor Poetry Competition’. Please use Times New Roman size 12, single space.

In the body of your email, please attach a 50 word third person biography and attach a photograph of yourself, which will be used for publication if you are selected, alongside your PayPal transaction number and contact details.

Interpret this theme as you may! You could submit work on the theme of relationships/ real life or virtual connections/ connections to the past, present or future/ connections found in the landscape: such as rivers, roads, paths. The interpretations are endless. However, we do advise against titling your poem ‘Connections’ — instead go for something original.

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The deadline for submissions is midnight of 1st November 2020. Within three weeks of the deadline a shortlist of 15 poems shall be announced. These 15 poems will then be displayed on our website and voted on by the public via email. (Strictly one vote per person, which will be checked carefully.) The winners will be announced at The Bangor Literary Journal Launch event. (Date coming soon. Yet to be decided if this will be virtual or not.) THIS YEAR’S PRIZES ARE:

First Place: £100 cash; a writing book and pen; a framed certificate; reading opportunities and your poem shall hang for one year at The Blackberry Path Art Studios. Plus, a special feature in the Winter issue of The Bangor Literary Journal. Second Place: £50 cash; a writing book and pen; a framed certificate, publication in The Bangor Literary Journal. Third Place: £30 cash; a writing book and pen; a framed certificate, publication in The Bangor Literary Journal.. Fourth Place: £10 cash and a certificate, publication in The Bangor Literary Journal. Fifth Place: £10 cash and a certificate, publication in The Bangor Literary Journal. There are shall also be 2 Highly Commended Poet certificates issued. All shortlisted exhibitors shall receive a certificate.

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