Friday, October 20, 2023: Patricia Walsh's "Conversations in the Foyer"

 Conversations in the Foyer

Not remembering the tawdry situations at will

One step back to heaven a choice mistake

Seated at the window at a going rate, yes

Following the advertised crash like the holy.

Layer by layer scan the opportune buildings

The sore eyes burning what is still bereft

Singular graffiti on the background muzak

The damned soul of the party packaged itself to hell.

Everything being glorious, ample tears swallowed

The absent God rummages through the shower

The roving heart quick to dissuade any massacre

The local dead joke is perennially funny, at will.

Relationships looking bad, strange type of humour

Sorrow running around in a haphazard daze

No wish to adopt, slandered enough as childless

Stamped before time the smug disposition.

Needing hardy friends, could do with one now

Everything distributed by personal post

Catering to the walk-ups on dint of convenience

Standing in place of the journey, in performance.

The jibes by request, conversations in the foyer

Fearing the flavoured piecemeal employment

Evicting hatred, not hard to realise a sport

Punctuated misgivings branding a proper date.

© 2023 Patricia Walsh

                                           The Conversation in the Foyer, 1880, by Edgar Degas




Patricia Walsh was born and raised in the parish of Mourneabbey, Co Cork, Ireland.  To date, she has published one novel, titled The Quest for Lost Eire, in 2014, and has published one collection of poetry, titled Continuity Errors, with Lapwing Publications in 2010. She has since been published in a variety of print and online journals across Ireland, The UK, USA, and Canada.  She has also published another novel, In The Days of Ford Cortina, in August 2021.

Women's History Month: Wednesday, March 10, 2021: Afric McGlinchey's poem "Moving the Pond"

Moving the Pond

A form we have no words for

–Philip Levine

 

You needed to move the pond

because we were about to reconstruct the house.

So you dug a new hole, further into the garden

and pondered how to move the lilies and fish

and would the frogs balk, come spring, at the disruption?

 

That was your main concern. And when I came out

with your tea, I was dismayed at the location

of the exhumed lozenge of soil – too long and narrow – 

having envisaged something more oval,

at a softer angle, and said so.

 

And, your shoulders slumped from the labour,

you looked at me. Some hours later,

after labouring at work of my own, I went out

to check on your progress, and saw

that you’d filled the hole and started again.

 

I remember when you holed up in your cave

for ten long weeks, before you came back to me.

These days, stair passions, kitchen kisses, are rare.

You leave your boots in the hallway.

I open the windows, creating a draught.

 

Whose turn to go out in the rain

to the shed for the milk? But here is the binding.

You started over for me. A muted subterranean urge.

I put my tongue to your throat and taste

the salt of it.

© 2021 Afric McGlinchey

Afric McGlinchey is an Irish poet with strong African connections. Her collections The lucky star of hidden things and Ghost of the Fisher Cat (Salmon Poetry) were translated into Italian and published by L’Arcolaio. Invisible Insane (SurVision) followed in 2019. Selected by Poetry Ireland Review as one of The Rising Generation (2016), she has received a Hennessy poetry award, Poets Meet Politics award, Northern Liberties prize, several bursaries from Cork County Council and the Arts Council of Ireland and numerous commendations. Tied to the Wind, a prose poetry memoir is forthcoming from Broken Sleep Books in 2021.

Karen J McDonnell: Two Poems: "An Invitation to the Late Mr. Yeats" and "Corridor Assessment"

An Invitation to the Late Mr Yeats

Return. Regenerate

like Coole's flooded gardens.

This birthday, renew

your initials on the copper beech.

Stay awhile. Listen to swan

wings whack October's lake.

Look for light: svelte,

slivering into the seven woods.

© 2019 Karen J McDonnell

Corridor Assessment

He is in the Assessment Unit.

We are in the corridor.

Later, I fetch coffee.

Plenty of time for small

talk. For memories of the aunt

who insisted on sea

dipping, in her nineties.

Shells and her swimming togs

in the coffin. She sent us

post-decimalisation envelopes

heavy with fifty-pence coins

she sellotaped to birthday cards.

Diagnosis is around the corner.

We might make ninety.

There's laughter in the corridor.

© 2019 Karen J McDonnell

Karen J McDonnell is published most recently in Irish Times New

Irish Writing, spontaneity.org, and special Irish editions of The

North and CoastToCoastToCoast. She has won several awards and

been listed in competitions, including 2018’s Anthony Cronin, and

Bangor poetry competitions and the 2017 Robert Monteith, Poems

for Patience, and Dermot Healy Poetry prizes. She has read at festivals

and spoken word venues around Ireland, and on RTÉ Radio's Sunday

Miscellany and The Poetry Programme. Awarded Tyrone Guthrie and

Birr writers’ residencies, her debut poetry collection is This Little World  

(Doire Press). She lives in the Burren, beside the Atlantic.

www.karenjmcdonnell.com

www.doirepress.com

National Women's Month: Karen J. McDonnell's photo "Where the Land Meets the Sky"

photo by Karen J McDonnell





Karen J McDonnell lives in the Burren on the West Coast of Ireland. Her writing has appeared in various newspapers, journals, and anthologies in Ireland, and in the U.S., most recently The Stony Brook Thursday Book and The Honest Ulsterman. Her work has been listed in, and won several competitions, and was nominated for Best of the Net, in the U.S. She holds a B.A. in Classics, History and Creative Writing, and a Diploma in Radio Production. In 2016, she was awarded a Tyrone Guthrie Bursary by Clare County Council which enabled her to work on her first poetry collection. www.karenjmcdonnell.com