It did not happen in my day
You say, as if young soldiers in Bastogne’s trenches were not checking out each other’s bayonets, as if Kamikaze pilots did not plunge to their deaths full of hetero-regrets – the virile vein of the homo-erect gashed by patriarchal etiquette. As if Roma romance died in Marzhan’s chambers, as
A RETURN TO THE EAST CAPE
un-curl yourself, beginning at the edge, then moving slowly inward, breath and sinew. the world has not been kind this winter, tied you up in small sharp endings and beginnings (much like fallow coloured glass you pick from tidepools on the eastern coast – you try to hug the jagged edges smooth bu
confessions from the bathroom sink
tonight i beg of you, strip me naked of all pretences let us fester in the sinews of your bed feverish between bated breaths and sticky flesh. deliver me and sheathe me so that i may rebirth a thousand excuses for your fleeting gentleness. suddenly, it is July, the fields are burning. i
Laissez les bons temps rouler
join the jazz funeral/ listen to the rehearsal/ pick the sweetest rose and crush it till the petals fall take shelter/ get hitched/ fry a dead catfish/ have a little Catholic mass/ count the seconds between the thunder and the flash clap your hands/ kiss your friends/ wander ‘r
love letter from home
no it’s not what you think it is; not batter rolled in a tight embrace every lunar new year (but you hear the lid slipping off already, so it could be). it’s adding the clock and weather apps as widgets (go to bed, wear extra layers, you know we can’t take the cold). it’s receiving […
After the Storm
They have black tongues, arteries which are rumoured to pumpcinders and tar. As they summon the gale, words drip like treaclefrom their blaspheming mouths, weaving a tale of two horses who gallop the town: one black, the other white,like a negative impression. With eyelashes wet from the storm,they
One Paris May Hide Another Paris
Words by Marianne Doherty. Art by Oliver Roberts.
Postcard from Dún Laoghaire’s West Pier
A fat seal drags itself up the harbour To gnaw on fishbones. In my dreams jaws clamp Round my skull, bring brittle bits of me back Down towards the seaweed, sludge and slime. I see it as I feel it. Troops expected France but spilled out of ships Here, at what was then Kingstown, To […]