A New Ulster issue seven

Featuring the works of Amy Barry, Neil Ellman, Oonah V Joslin, Michael Loughran, David McLean, Maire Morrissey-Cummins, Chris Murray, Felino A. Soriano, Rachel Sutcliffe, Rachael Stanley, Brigid Walshe and Adrian Fox. Hard copies can be purchased from our website.

Issue No 7 April 2013

A New Ulster On the Wall Website

Editor: Amos Greig Editor: Arizahn Editor: Adam Rudden Contents

Cover Image by Editorial

Amos Greig page 6

Amy Barry; The Causatum My Mother Shadows on the Irish Sea

page 7 page 8 page 10

Neil Ellman; The Charisma of Wild Dreams The Palace of the Windowed Rocks Ventriloquist and Crier in the moor TIME – camouflage moss green

page 12 page 13 page 14 page 15

Oonah V Joslin; Love to the power  Sunday School Trip My First Elephant Mopping up Lessons Sunburst Skirt Cinders Down to Earth Paint box Philosophy

page 17 page 18 page 19 page 20 page 21 page 22 page 23 page 24

Michael Loughran; The Daily Peals Concern for the Dead Batman in Carnlough Bellurgan Point: A Portrait On Ellis Island

page 26 page 27 page 28 page 29 page 30

David McLean; Subject position & sunrise Unimportant swords & the gray Where it was

page 32 page 33 page 34-35

Maire Morrissey-Cummins; The Commute Letter to my daughter The Measure of Life Rusty Clippings Guilt - A Small Life

page 37 page 38-39 page 40 page 41 page 42

Chris Murray; A reed song

page 44

2

Felino A. Soriano; Of trumpet +13+ +14+

page 46 page 47 page 48

Rachel Sutcliffe; DisOrder Sunday dinner

page 50 page 51

Rachael Stanley; 2053

page 53

Brigid Walshe; Regrets; for the way we were

page 55-56

On The Wall Message from the Alleycats

page 58

Maire Morrisey-Cummins; Maire’s work can be found

pages 60-66 Round the Back

Adrian Fox

page 68

Manuscripts, art work and letters to be sent to: Submissions Editor A New Ulster 24 Tyndale Green, Belfast BT14 8HH Alternatively e-mail: g.greig3@gmail.com See page 52 for further details and guidelines regarding submissions. Hard copy distribution is available c/o Lapwing Publications, 1 Ballysillan Drive, Belfast BT14 8HQ Digital distribution is via links on our website: https://sites.google.com/site/anewulster/

3

Published in Baskerville Produced in Belfast, Northern Ireland.

All rights reserved The artists have reserved their right under Section 7 Of the Copyright, Design and Patents Act 1988 To be identified as the authors of their work.

4

Editorial ‎ arch has been a fairly good month artistically speaking there are so many M publications and anthologies coming out that I am reminded or the arrival of birds as they journey from the Saharan deserts. My own work has been published in three anthologies and I’m working on several art pieces as well.

As March ended and April approached we were hit by some fairly heavy snow fall here at A New Ulster. It affected our power and left us snowed in for roughly seven days. One benefit of this was an opportunity to engage in some painting and a few sketches. I did miss the launch of Poetry in Motion’s launch of Moments the anthology that one of my poems appeared in. The poem in question was written twelve years ago at the John Hewitt summer school.

I found myself wondering how long is it reasonable to wait to try and get a poem published? I had never submitted this poem to any journal or publication before there is a period of waiting which chafes at the nerves the anticipation and worry. I understand what it’s like to wait for that letter, email or phone call. That is why at A New Ulster we try to respond as quickly as possible to each and every submission. Sometimes there are so any submissions though that there may be delays in communication.

We have been experimenting with recording poetry and have been using Soundcloud as well as Audicity. If we can get the kinks worked out we will look into adding sound recordings of poems onto the website. Speaking of the website I’d like to thank Adam Rudden for all the hard work that he has put into making the website not only look amazing but functional as well.

Enough pre-amble! Onto the creativity!

Amos Greig

5

Biographical Note: Amy Barry Amy Barry writes poems and short stories. Her poems have been published in anthologies, journals, and e-zines, in Ireland and abroad. Travels to India, Nepal, China, Bali, Paris, Berlin, have all inspired her work. She lives in Athlone, Ireland.

6

The Causatum

(Japan-March 2011)

Quivering fear, a dread of another. They all were listening, to the voices on the radio. Children, families stared at the sky darkened to the same gray as the water, they couldn’t tell where the sea ended and the sky began.

They shook their heads, searching for answers, the crisis spiraling out of control.

What could be salvaged?

In the center of the room, two village elders, on their knees, had fallen silent. Smoke from joss sticks, veiled their ancient faces. Sunken eyes, flabby jaws, their lips moving.

Supplicating.

Amy Barry 7

My Mother

I remember, she struggled to open her eyes, fought her way through delirium, her lips wrinkled like dried dates.

Dazed by heavy medication she slept then woke confused, alarmed, floated in and out of dreams.

Her cheekbones protruded her smooth pale face, the smell of urine lingered on her once white dress, she had become nothing but bones, and frail misfortune.

In the cloudless sky one winter spring morning, she opened her eyes her pupils dull, she took my hand, placed it on her breast, she knew, sobbed softly, steadying herself on me, ‘Take good care of yourself.’

8

Thinner, smaller, the life force leaving,

Silent, I knew, I had to let her Go.

Amy Barry 9

Shadows on the Irish Sea

Pain gathered in his chest, a sense of being marooned, so thick, it clotted, choked his breathing.

His wife, lying in some unmarked grave, he wished he was invisible, had evaporated into green-silk, and misty air.

Sun set in sharp autumn chill, black shadows, quavered, her image on a rippling sea.

Amy Barry 10

Biographical Note: Neil Ellman Neil Ellman lives and writes in New Jersey. More than 700 of his poems appear in print and online journals, anthologies, broadsides and eleven pamphlet/chapbooks throughout the world. He has been nominated twice for Best of the Net, as well as for a Rhysling Award from the Science Fiction Writers Association.

11

The Charisma of Wild Dreams

(after the painting by Jonathan Lasker) Charismatic spells and charms magnetic lure of turbulence in dreams the allure of the senseless wild draws us in, compels; we wander in a briar patch of artefacts and memories lost travellers through a world familiar but foreign overgrown but desolate filled with unfamiliar truths we are attracted to to the wilderness in dreams as if it were the truth.

Neil Ellman 12

The Palace of the Windowed Rocks

(after the painting by Yves Tanguy) I live here in the palace of the windowed rocks among the shadows cast by pinnacles of salt anticipate the nether world defeated by the sun the moon, the universe my own conceit I, hidden, secreted behind hot glass and stone I, alone among the stalagmites that rise from hell contemplate my destiny and wish that I were never born.

Neil Ellman 13

Ventriloquist and Crier in the Moor

(after the painting by Paul Klee) My voice reverberates though empty rooms impersonates the wind the trees, the moors another’s life I am here, there wherever you hear me throw my voice I am there still here I masquerade the likeness of myself in wood I pull the strings or it pulls mine my voice is its or its is mine.

Neil Ellman 14

TIME - camouflage moss green,

(after the painting by Takashi Murakami) Seconds in hours days in weeks months in stolen years.

Centuries pass behind a cloud and disappear.

Millennia camouflaged In moss-green oblivion— this masquerade of life concealed by time.

Neil Ellman 15

Biographical Note: Oonah V Joslin Oonah V Joslin was born in Ballymena and now lives in Northumberland from where she edits the e-zine Every Day Poets. Oonah has won three MicroHorror prizes and has judged both poetry and nmicrofiction competitions. You can find out more at http://www.oovj.wordpress.com

16

Love to the power 

(Practically speaking, a physicist needs only 39 digits of Pi) to make a circle the size of the observable universe.) true love is irrational a transcendental constant symbolised by a circle of gold x diameters like a kiss to travel revolutions  is one of the biggest numbers known bigger than the universe requires without recurrence it goes on and on you and I and love to the power  the answer to infinity

Oonah V Joslin

17

Sunday School Trip

The sash window with its leather pull-up strap too heavy for young arms defies me but once open, hands and head push through to feel the breeze, taste smoke, the danger of tunnels.

Scratchy seats stipple dimples on knees mother fusses, warns and clucks as the train clacks on over the points, to the end of the track and safety of buffers.

We return each year to beach and salty sea, salt crisps, sandwiches, sandcastles, sandals, sand; a long day’s play.

Clink of teacups in the orange hall echoes sanctimonious supervision.

Later supine on the seat I imagine the net rack above me filled with fishes and loaves.

The long day has been swallowed by a whale I fit into my new bucket along with razors, crab shells, star-fish-peppermint-rock-pool dreams.

The seamless joggling rocks me, rocks me, rocks me as any child making his journey home.

Oonah V Joslin 18

My first elephant

My first elephant thought we were twins my sister and me, dressed in Sunday best.

Couldn’t tell the difference between me in blue and her in green, like he’d never seen children before.

He raised his great grey trunk sniffing all wrinkled not neat as pins like us not flecked with tweed.

Splattered with mud he was and curious.

I moved away cautiously.

Decided I didn’t like zoos.

I was afraid I might mess up my shoes.

Oonah V Joslin 19

Mopping Up Lessons Fifties cream and brown classroom dÊcor, teacher’s frown.

Graffiti-carved oak desks with lift-up lid and turn-down seat.

Unfathomable symbols everywhere.

Writing well, blue-black Quink ink.

Everything neat on the line.

Cast-iron chimney stove rose high as times tables.

Row upon row, of third-pint bottles wait in crate; frosted silver caps thawed by the stove for break.

I suck the slick of sour, gloopy cream.

Swallow hard.

Throw up.

They call my sister from the yard make her get a bucket; mop it up.

Humiliation.

Salt of tears made permanent by pee sours all success.

Oonah V Joslin 20

Sunburst Skirt My yellow skirt was pleated like a million rays of sun it rose, covered in roses; formed a circle as I spun around and round, it twirled open like summer flowers white, orange, yellow, green, lemon sear-sucker blouse fluffy bolero puff-sleeve top cascading waves of golden locks.

Was there anything in town as bright as my feet in citrus ankle socks or me in my sunburst skirt?

Oonah V Joslin 21

Cinders

They called it a ball I dressed for a ball in a ball gown of blue

all chiffonny new under-layered with net Cinders, eat your heart out!

I’ll never forget the look on their faces my mini-skirt friends.

Nothing erases their pitying looks as they begged me to stay.

There was no magic coach to whisk me away and so the story ends unhappily.

Oonah V Joslin 22

Down to earth Give me the feet for seven measured years laced into start-rites broad of toe and I will give you the woman

teetering a moment on high heels toying with the idea of platforms

but not for long.

Oonah V Joslin 23

Paint Box Philosophy Shades of green jade, bottle, Brunswick, sap, emerald, forest mine all mine. I find the perfect purple for tree trunks.

Ask my mother what the white is for.

At twelve I’ve twelve long months ahead in which to dance and dare to read, write, paint and be this living book.

White is for mixing.

Jaded, control illusory, sap dry.

The older self, afraid, seeks ochre-rich shades; warmth for the sombre crimson of my own, dear blood.

White was for muddying.

Oonah V Joslin 24

Biographical note: Michal Loughran Michael Loughran, 22, was born and raised in Belfast, Northern Ireland. He spends much of his time wandering with a notepad and an untrustworthy biro. He's had work published with Crannog, The Poetry Bus, wordlegs, inksweat&tears and The Journal.

25

The Daily Peals.

Clappers interrupt each morning with laboured, sonorous thwacks.

Birds skitter on branches, and scarper no competing with that racket!

They even meddle with thoughts; an oxidized bell welcomes itself to tea, custard creams and the remote.

It is enough to drive you mad, a bit like Sweeney, the mad king.

Was he really? S'pose he wanted peace from bells that cluttered the country and it was all an elaborate ruse?

Never just the one, either. Many ring, often just out of sync, each toll louder than the previous. Do bell-ringers pant and tug their ropes in competition?

There is even the Angelus on RTÉ.

Not ringing through foggy dew, but T.V, making each chew on dinner considered, like a dog caught with a slipper.

Michael Loughran

26

Concern for the Dead.

Be certain about it, then bury me.

Tumble me into a trench. Drop me into the deeps of a cave. Get an axe.

Excoriate. Feast on strips and slabs.

Slather my skull in red ochre...

No. Put me to rest among others.

Nestle a pet between my ankles.

Sprinkle the grave with periwinkles.

Make sure I'm anatomically correct, that my legs and arms are in check.

Lend me a sword, lay it lengthwise, pommel against my chin, east to west.

Elevate the ground. Build a mound.

Construct a dolmen like Poulnabrone.

Embalm me. Scramble my brain.

Replace my eyes with obsidian...

Do whatever it takes, then leave.

Leave the body to deteriorate and convert what it was, again, as it always has, and will again until all remaining stars go out.

Michael Loughran 27

Batman in Carnlough.

I left him there, slanted-eyes skyward, somewhere near the marram, half-buried as a wall of cumulonimbus edged in;

granules accrued on his grey-blue suit, submerged a yellow belt, black boots, black cape, and swallowed a prong-eared cowl...

I look back and wonder if the tide came and rescued him. If, from the shallow grave, it delivered him, and returned him to Gotham.

Michael Loughran 28

Bellurgan Point: A Portrait.

Landscape fatigues. Sky, a sepulchral expanse, and ground, another sepulchral sheet, though this' muculent, converge on a horizon out on a bitter, rippling sea.

On this grey canvas are stranded boats, who bore the brunt of gales and slanted rains, and yet – colour splashes of it on the boats; red, blue, and green leap from grey.

Their masts matches. Windows catch faint light.

I find myself among the boats, stomping sediment, forming footprints with each laboured step, peeling flakes of paint, calling crews long disembarked, spooking birds (who, back among long-grassed banks, vanish), inspecting trails of viscera on decks, and tapping panes upon panes in search of hoary seafarers, who may or may not have tall tales to tell, until I lose track of time, and place, and name.

So I sit and sink into earth, look back at a pallid cottage reduced in scale, and rest beside a scarred trawler.

Blank beams puncture clouds, pools reflect paler heavens, and I wait, wait, wait for some incoming tide.

Michael Loughran

29

On Ellis Island Breath waxed and waned on windows.

Sullied adults and children looked in awe at Manhattan, it gleamed across the way and I stood watching from the present, as mothers bit nails and twisted garments fearing inspections and long detentions or an untimely return home with the lame in a cramped, leaky boat rocking eastward across the vast, sub-zero graveyard.

I paced the same scuffed wood floors, and smelt myriad odours; sea, sweat, lovers memories that lingered in stitching.

In one frigid room a priest performed make-shift mass, coats as pews, hands gestured skywards: prayers. Did their stoicism lessen on arrival day, now they were but hours away from an expectant cousin, a kindly patron, and a dusty fourth floor room in a tenement?

Along the narrow sick-bay corridors, echoes, a thousand tongues, and high-pitched squeals cries as doctors prodded with instruments.

I followed the steps of millions into the dock, from weary, aspirational men and women to tourists who flock year upon year to check if a family member survived that journey and got a foothold in that blooming country.

Michael Loughran

30

Biographical Note: David McLean David McLean is from Wales but has lived in Sweden since 1987. He lives there with his dog and cats. In addition to six chapbooks, McLean is the author of three full-length poetry collections: CADAVER’S DANCE (Whistling Shade Press, 2008), PUSHING LEMMINGS (Erbacce Press, 2009), and LAUGHING AT FUNERALS (Epic Rites Press, 2010).

His first novel HENRIETTA REMEMBERS is coming in 2014. During 2013 a seventh chapbook SHOUTING AT GHOSTS is forthcoming from Grey Book Press. More information

about

McLean can

be

blog http://mourningabortion.blogspot.com/

31

found at

his

subject position

the subject posits himself somewhere in the sentence with deliberate gender and massive attacks of ponderous and pompous the golden fucking bowl, insolent subject at home

sunrise

the sun comes up as if apologetic, and submerged somewhere spin the ironic stars their massive absence everywhere they are not in us, not here, they purr as fat as cats and we are still nowhere

David McLean 32

unimportant swords

they dress words up like unimportant swords somebody forgot after a battle once, one that didn't matter much; just sticks and stones for children, which do not matter either, because the earth is for bodies and blood, and not one of us likes to do enough living

the gray

the gray is death and forgettable, dust and muffins, so a text is nascent sexuality becoming itself again, remnants and ruin, corpulent cadavers dancing where nothing takes many chances we are the absent dead and we are the dancing

David McLean 33

where it was

i where it was there was just one evident god on the apparent water, as if every washing machine had long since surrendered itself and been sold because of dreams or for some other impossible reasons, it was the living death of trees that might come together to stand outside a house and bless it or curse it, depending upon their temper and upon the weather ii a shaded glade for the decline of memory and all the harsh and punitive fathers, all the medieval children who are ghosts and dead and centuries away, maybe light dancing on a dead leaf, it might just have been dreaming iii and you were still sleeping motionless, a burden on some bed that might have been mine since time begun, or maybe just a few years and a personal history that never seemed important, just the blood that rises in veins while Cadaver waits impatient on his mouldy pillow like a sexy extra in a zombie move . the water was in my veins like time was, and you were a tribute and a tributary, unnecessary rivers running out of Eden and forever and spreading everywhere like consciousness of the Other being nothing and superfluous, being arrows and answers, the spastic dance of all the other absences iv and we bled memory, Amanda, like night lies down to surrender passion naked on a cannibal god's plate, and no Jesus to wash the needy feet of all the deaf lepers, all the dead men just time still waiting to end and be memory again

34

v and the necessity of resurrection was not your perpetual motionlessness, not the sun leaping up like a spring duck from frozen water to assert life and the dreadful inevitability of eternal return. it was just you and me and dirty sheets, another nothing to be, not nights of the white Christ, just this tenuous subsistence, the timelessness of memory in me, you alive, here in me we are always need and night

David McLean

35

Biographical note: Mรกire Morrissey-Cummins Mรกire is Irish. She is early retired and has found joy in writing and art. She loves to get lost in words or paint.

She has been published with Every Day Poets, Wordlegs, The First Cut, New Ulster, Open Road Review, The Galway Review, Bray Arts, Notes from the Gean, Lynx, A Hundred Gourds, and many online and print magazines worldwide.

.

36

The Commute The train empties dark coats shuffle the ticket barrier spilling into the station.

Collars upturned, shadows shudder a biting night.

Bodies collide diverging the pavement.

A bus engine hums, stench of diesel fouls the air.

Shadows bounce under the lamplight.

Legs scramble waiting cars.

Doors bang, headlights blare.

The crush of bodies calms as I crouch the grimy night.

Key in the latch, smiling eyes greet me.

My heart warms as I close the door on the daily grind.

Mรกire Morrissey-Cummins 37

Letter to my daughter

“I sat down to write to my daughter and this poem unfolded. I realised when I was writing it that she grew up in Holland and her Irish years were just a few and she now lives and works in Madrid due to the recession. She is my Irish girl but she hardly lived here. I hope someday she will return as I did.”

I used your mug for my tea today, I thought it needed airing.

Your name etched in green with the Irish flag flying, a white shamrock growing on the side.

It is a fine mug, from your Kylemore days, befitting your name, testament to your Irishness.

As I hold it up, it catches the light.

I see the flash of orange, but your Dutch life comes to mind, and then a splash of red taints my thoughts as I acknowledge your new Spanish life.

With your Irish mug in hand, you are my cailín na hÉireann but you barely lived here.

The sun is shining today, the garden radiant with a glint of your touch in the chard, still growing strong.

And the mustard cress, from one seed, a massive mound.

You, who had no interest in gardening have left so much of your spirit behind.

The yellow rose has more buds than it could ever hope to bloom, 38

and the white Lilac is sweetly scented especially for you.

I smile to myself, mo leanbh beag bán-dearg and I wish you were here today.

Lunch in the garden has no appeal without you.

The new teak loungers lonely on the deck, they await your return.

The fold-up table, weathered from our years of use.

It holds memories of your wonderful salads, displayed and presented lovingly in the wide ceramic bowl.

I think of the countless pots of tea, the elder flower cordial and the jam we made together as we journeyed through our Greystones years.

I look at the garden, there are traces of you everywhere in all your glory.

Note: Kylemore days – Kylemore Abbey Boarding School, Galway, Ireland where my daughter studied for five years while we lived in Holland.

The school has recently been closed sadly. my cailín na hÉireann = Gaelic for my Irish girl mo leanbh beag bándearg = Gaelic for my little pink girl

Máire Morrissey-Cummins 39

The Measure of Life She coiled her hair in curling tongs.

Ringlets danced her shoulders, bounced like springs, down her back, as she cocked her head to usher me into her room.

I glimpsed her blithe look in the mirror.

My little girl still playing a game of dress up.

Fixing her makeup, her cheeks contoured, eyes sparkling, lips, a glossy shine, I basked in her glow, in glory and wonder.

I recalled the tears, the years of straightening her twists and turns.

We hugged with pride, a Master in Psychoanalysis.

And as we commenced to her graduation, the rain lashed her curls straight.

Mรกire Morrissey-Cummins 40

Rusty Clippings The old lady who lives in the house on the seafront, stands with rusty shears trimming her hedge of purple Hebe.

Elbows bent, she clips salty air, watching for people passing by.

A sprawling house in a state of disrepair, her life exists in a solitary room.

Loneliness seeps from faded rose patterned wallpaper.

Curtains sag, stale with senility.

A tired burgundy carpet threads the stairs to a forgotten world.

Framed photographs stare from the mantelpiece, their faces buried in her memory.

Her eyes gaze out the sea, absorbed by the soothing swish of the waves.

Her life story held in the flow of an ever changing tide and the rusty shears by the hedge

Mรกire Morrissey-Cummins

41

Guilt - A Small Life A granite seat by the seafront, the wild winds of June wrap around me.

I stare out to sea eyes well up with tears her angry words clog my mind.

Alone with my thoughts, fears unravel, weave with the salty sea breeze.

I taste freedom, a burning strength surges within.

I close my eyes breathe in the briny air, unbridle myself of my mother's guilt, her small world a game of blame.

I watch seagulls dip wings outstretched skimming reflections.

Seaweed sways in sun-filled tide pools, waters lap clouds drift anxiety abates.

I stand to leave, the wind shifts behind me urging me on.

My hair catches the breeze swept up in a gale, coat flapping I’m almost ready to fly.

42

Biographical Note: Chris Murray Chris Murray is a City and Guilds Stone-cutter. Her poetry is published in Ropes Magazine, Crannóg Magazine, The Burning Bush Online Revival Meeting (Issue 1), Carty’s Poetry Journal, Caper Literary Journal , CanCan The Southword Journal (MLC)andthe Diversity Blog (PIWWC; PEN International Women Writer’s Committee). Her poem for three voices, Lament, was performed at the Béal festival in 2012. She has reviewed poetry for Post (Mater dei Institute),Poetry Ireland and Writing.ie. Chris writes a poetry blog called Poethead which is dedicated to the writing, editing and translation of women writers. She is a member of the International PEN Women Writer’s Committee, and the Social Media coordinator and Web-developer for Irish PEN.

43

a reed song

whistle-in sing the hollow-pipes of bird-bone or leg-tube jointed to.

leech into soil's black trauma a double-reed will always carry down

its muffled tune from contort of leaf to nub of root

there is bone substance to the fallen bough as there is to the winged-bird both perfume.

a maerl of barely encloses both the feathered and the not, a shell maybe -

Chris Murray

44

Biographical note: Felino A. Soriano Felino A. Soriano has authored nearly five dozen collections of poetry, including Extolment in the praising exhalation of jazz (Kind of a Hurricane Press, 2013), the collaborative volume with poet, Heller Levinson and visual artist, Linda Lynch, Hinge Trio (La Alameda Press, 2012) and rhythm:s (Fowlpox Press, 2012). He publishes the online endeavours Counterexample Poetics and Differentia Press. His work finds foundation in philosophical studies and connection to various idioms of jazz music. He lives in California with his wife and family and is the director of supported living and independent living programs providing supports to adults with developmental disabilities. For further information, please visit www.felinoasoriano.info.

45

from Quintet Dialogues: translating introspection Of trumpet

┟12┟ rewind to the version un-yet developed, for the body imposes impractical skeletal survival leading to culture-birthing importance of etched circumstantial freedoms,

—prisms engage solely when attended, attained, affirmed through windows and willingness to perforate temporal re-living, inadequately labelled in the sobriquet of reminiscence

Felino A. Soriano 46

┟13┟ fascinated colours fissures the indentations’ gradated freedoms of modular travels unravelling as do fingers among a weakened momentary hiatus of trust lavender into gray yellow manifestations abridging darkened necessary meaning meandering across fallible landscapes hovering or when silence recreates angled listening, absurd

Felino A. Soriano 47

┼14┼ outside the photograph of silence escaped each exposing hand and the reuniting aspects of sound or improvised collaborations of nuance the unframed body or quoted an onlooking dichotomy “____________” following release the corporeal insignia left within steps’ organic feature of ambulatory understanding

Felino A. Soriano 48

paused

Biographical note: Rachel Sutcliffe Rachel Sutcliffe has suffered from an atypical form of lupus for the past 12 years, since her early twenties. Throughout this time writing has been a great form of therapy, it’s kept her from going insane. Rachel is an active member of a writing group, and she also has her own blog which may be found @ http://projectwords11.wordpress.com She has seen many of her pieces published in various anthologies and journals, both in print and online, including thefirstcut, Barefoot Review and Every Day Poets plus the haiku journals Shamrock, Lynx, The Heron’s Nest, A Hundred Gourds and Notes From The Gean.

49

DisOrder There’s a crumb on the carpet Ignore it, You’ve hoovered today.

There’s a smudge on the sideboard Forget it, You’ve polished today.

There’s a mark on the window Leave it, You’ve cleaned today.

I can’t Can’t ignore them, That crumb That smudge That mark.

I’ll clean Then it’ll be ok, One day Won’t it?

Rachel Sutcliffe

50

Sunday dinner As a child it was my job To lay the table For Sunday dinner.

I remember the Sunday you called As I laid the table And the scent of roast dinner Wafted through the house.

You told us she’d died.

My favourite Aunt Was suddenly No more.

Still now Years later Every time I smell a roast That wave of shock and grief hits Yet again.

Rachel Sutcliffe

51

Biographical Note: Rachael Stanley Rachael Stanley has published poetry in Ireland and overseas. Her work has been published in Static Poetry volumes II and III, Everyday Poets, Wednesday Haiku at Issa’s Untidy Hut, Riposte, The First Cut, and News Four.

52

2053 It’s in the news, the year 2053 the year that Ireland will make the final payment on her national debt.

The offenses of the few inflicted on the many for a lifetime and beyond.

Before my head gets lost in fiscal details, it’s the date that catches my eye and makes me gasp momentarily for air.

For in 2053 I’ll be ninety-eight and I wonder where I will be and whether I should opt for cremation or burial.

Man does not live on bread alone nor can he live solely on fresh air.

This prompts the question whether there’ll ever be a marriage between the solid matter of currency and the esoteric element of air?

I ask whether we will ever learn to render unto Caesar and unto the Absolute in equal measure?

I ask these existential questions, but all that comes to me between the silent pauses are curiously self interested ones.

Where will I be in 2053 when time will surely have run out for me?

Will I still be here, waiting for the unknown to come and claim me or will I have travelled to a place or state of vision and knowledge and find that once again, I must return to learn the lessons unlearnt while I was a flesh and bone child of the earth?

Rachael Stanley 53

Biographical Note: Brigid Walshe Brigid Walshe usually produces combined artwork and poetry pieces most of which can be seen on her blog. After reading about the Magdalene Laundries Brigid was moved to produce a poem and artwork based on how she felt. Brigid’s blog can be found http://brigidwalshe.wordpress.com/

54

Regrets for the way we were. By Brigid Walshe

55

Regrets for the way we were.

From belly to finger, pious stares.

Cold, judgemental, religious glares.

Tell tale body, giving life, Bastard inside, not a wife.

Slut, whore, carry the blame.

Motherly pride, matriarch shame.

Secret birth, agonising pain.

Unfeeling detachment try to feign.

Tears unshed, bright they shine.

Decision made for this child of mine.

Blue, black eyes sadly reproached, But unstoppable now the time approached.

I held you close, I held you tight, Whispered of love, through the dead of night.

I touched your face, caressed your skin, My miracle of love, you are not a sin.

They sent you child, to the arms of a stranger.

To love, protect, keep from danger.

Years long passed, your life I have missed.

Only memories and aches, for the brow once kissed.

To a better life, they sold you away.

Yet all of my life, the price I would pay.

Brigid Walshe

56

If you fancy submitting something but haven’t done so yet, or if you would like to send us some further examples of your work, here are our submission guidelines: SUBMISSIONS NB – All artwork must be in either BMP or JPEG format. Indecent and/or offensive images will not be published, and anyone found to be in breach of this will be reported to the police.

Images must be in either BMP or JPEG format.

Please include your name, contact details, and a short biography. You are welcome to include a photograph of yourself – this may be in colour or black and white.

We cannot be responsible for the loss of or damage to any material that is sent to us, so please send copies as opposed to originals.

Images may be resized in order to fit “On the Wall”. This is purely for practicality.

E-mail all submissions to: g.greig3@gmail.com and title your message as follows: (Type of work here) submitted to “A New Ulster” (name of writer/artist here); or for younger contributors: “Letters to the Alley Cats” (name of contributor/parent or guardian here). Letters, reviews and other communications such as Tweets will be published in “Round the Back”. Please note that submissions may be edited. All copyright remains with the original author/artist, and no infringement is intended.

These guidelines make sorting through all of our submissions a much simpler task, allowing us to spend more of our time working on getting each new edition out!

57

APRIL 2013'S MESSAGE FROM THE ALLEYCATS: If you are reading this, then we shall presume that you were not devoured by a rampaging yeti. Congratulations on avoiding such a grim fate during our most recent ice age. We Alleycats spent it indoors, but our proof reader went out on several cross country type runs with their hounds. Running…snow…dogs…no, no logic there at all!

Well, that’s just about it from us for this edition everyone.

Thanks again to all of the artists who submitted their work to be presented “On the Wall”. As ever, if you didn’t make it into this edition, don’t despair! Chances are that your submission arrived just too late to be included this time. Check out future editions of “A New Ulster” to see your work showcased “On the Wall”.

58

Biographical Note: Mรกire Morrissey-Cummins Mรกire is Irish, married with two adult children. She lived abroad for many years, working in Holland mainly and Mรกire lives between Wicklow, Ireland and Trier, Germany at present. She loves nature and is a published haiku writer.

Mรกire retired early from the Financial Sector and found art and poetry. She is really enjoying the experience of getting lost in words and paint.

59

Emigrant Lives by Maire Morrissey-Cummins

60

Midnight Sky by Maire Morrissey-Cummins

61

Primroses Peep by Maire Morrissey-Cummins

62

Unravel by Mรกire Morrissey-Cummins

63

Moon on Waves by Mรกire Morrissey-Cummins

64

Nesting by Mรกire Morrissey-Cummins

65

Sheep drifting by Mรกire Morrissey-Cummins

66

Biographical Note: Adrian Fox

Born in Kent, England of Irish parents, returning to Belfast in 1967, Adrian has an M.A. from Lancaster University and The poets house, Donegal. He was taught by the great poet James Simmons.

Adrian’s poems have been published by Cyphers, Poetry Ireland, the Honest Ulsterman, and The Black Mountain Review, as well as four collections by Lapwing and Lagan Press.

His poems have been translated into Hungarian; and whilst in Hungary, Adrian taught in the main university as part of a peace programme in 2003.

He has produced a CD, ‘Violets’, a homage based on the lost lives of all who died in Northern Ireland. In addition to all of these, Adrian is also a painter and teaches poetry online at: www.adrianfox.org

67

THE FORM OF THESE WORDS ARE CREATED BY THE MOMENT. Why do we want to create a magic formula for yesterday, form is the moment and the word the moment creates the form. Form is not a structured way of saying something you've written, a formula a haiku or a sonnet. Do you want to do what was done yesterday and go the academic route to refine it or do you want to do what's you?

Jack Kerouac one of the great beat writers told us to 'write as if were the first person on earth' and Wallace Stevens told us that 'the theory of poetry is the theory of life' THE FORM OF THESE WORDS IS CREATED BY THE MOMENT. Beat poetry was new and experimental as were the words of Walt Whitman and when we heard it first we went wow and since then have tried to fit our words into the past’s parameters but it was the moment of change that created those magic words, so we've got to let the moment create the form. Beat poetry is named so because it captures the essence of beat poetry it has life a rhythm a pulse. Ok I know I fall down on the grammatical front but isn't all new writing politically and grammatically in or incorrect?

THE FORM OF THESE WORDS ARE CREATED BY THE MOMENT. Form is a moment lost in time and we harness that moment with words, form is not a way of saying something written on a page, we know that we can never capture that moment but why not create a moment from that moment not by reliving the formula but by creating a new form from the magic of a form it’s not its steps that creates its magic it’s the moment. Words have a rhythm a magic of their own and they find a rhyme within the moment (the form). We can never reproduce the magic of a haiku or a brilliant villanelle but it was the combination of words that caught that moment.

Life is experimental, we are stepping into the unknown (if we want) stepping into truth, our truth, let us create the dimensions of our truth of our moment and as Joseph Attila said let the 'silence of our dreams take on a human form'.

MY TRUTH Adrian Fox

68

LAPWING PUBLICATIONS RECENT, NEW And FORTHCOMING TITLES 9781907276798 Martin Domleo The Haunted Barn: A Novella 9781907276804 Helen Soraghan Dwyer Beyond 9781907276811 Richard Brooks Metaphysical Flaw 9781907276828 Martin Burke For / Because / After 9781907276835 Gerry McDonnell Ragged Star 9781907276842 James O’Sullivan Kneeling on the Redwood Floor 9781907276859 Una ni Cheallaigh Salamander Crossing 9781907276866 Teresa Lally Doll 9781907276873 Lynne Edgar Trapeze 9781907276880 Paul Tobin Blessed by Magpies 9781907276897 Laurence James Deliquesence of Dust 9781907276903 Marc Carver London Poems 9781907276910 Iain Britton druidic approaches 9781907276927 Gillian Somerville-Large Karamania 9781907276934 Martha Rowsell Another Journey Like This 9781907276941 Kate Ashton The Concourse of Virgins 9781907276958 Martin Domleo Sheila 9781907276965 Tommy Murray Swimming with Dolphins 9781907276972 John O’Malley Invisible Mending 9781907276989 J.C.Ireson The Silken Ladder 9781907276996 Mariama Ifode Senbazuru 9781909252004 Keeper of the Creek Rosy Wilson 9781909252011 Ascult? Linitea Vorbind hear silence speaking x Peter Sragher 9781909252028 Songs of Steelyard Sue J.S. Watts 9781909252035 Paper Patterns Angela Topping 9781909252042 Orion: A Poem Sequence Rosie Johnston 9781909252059 Disclaimer Tristan Moss 9781909252066 Things out of Place Oliver Mort 9781909252073 Human Shores Byron Beynon 9781909252080 The Non Herein Michael McAloran 9781909252097 Chocolate Spitfires Sharon Jane Lansbury 9781909252103 Will Your Spirit Fly? Richard Brooks 9781909252110 Out of Kilter George Beddows intro x Jeremy Reed 9781909252127 Eruptions Jefferson Holdridge (out soon) 9781909252134 In the Consciousness of Earth Rosalin Blue 9781909252141 The Wave Rider Eva Lindroos (out soon) There are other new works in various stages of preparation.

All titles £10.00 per paper copy Or In PDF format £5.00 for 4 titles.

69