RECENT WORK
Gathering Rose Buds
Featured on RTE Radio One, Sunday Miscellany, April 2023
I tell the 1980’s baby: to do your shopping, you had to go through a hostile border. I tell her she could have been born right there in No Man’s Land pointing to the remains of border as we pass from Derry or Londonderry, (or whatever you’re having yourself ) into Donegal. I show her the remnants of the checkpoint and tell her about being stopped one night as we returned from shopping. Standing at the side of the road while they searched the boot, the soldiers eyed me up wondering whether the bulge under my coat was a bomb or a baby…
THE NAG
Published by Trasna, Spring Edition, 2023
The pillow is digging into his neck and every frail tendon is impinged. An eyelash is in his eye again. The carer has placed him upright in the bed, so he is facing the window looking at a blue sea covered in sun drops. Water dislodges the eyelash and wets his face. As he lies against the pillows immobilised, a shape mentions itself out of the corner of his eye. In time, he sees an old brown horse has wandered up to his window. It must have come from the beach and into the garden. He hasn’t seen this horse before. As he tries to figure out who owns him and where he comes from, the horse meets his eyes.
Storm Raiser
Published by the Leinster Leader & featured by the Orkney Heritage Society
They said we hid men’s penises in trees. We took their power and turned their member into birds. We pictured this - the penises, like birds in a nest, popped up with their blushing tips and hungry mouths. They said we leave men with nothing to do but consider their floppy organs.‘I’m telling you,’ my sister insisted, as we tittered and shook our heads. ‘John says it’s in that book - The Witch’s Hammer. ‘No, really,’ she said,as we threw back our heads and let rise a great belly laugh.
Dust
Published in The Moth Literary Magazine
It takes half a week to write about a woman with a shoe fetish, but I persist. The smell of leather, low slung heels and suede stilettos, follows me around the house. Round toed Mary Janes, pumps and a stash of secret moments, wrapped in satin and stored on a dozen shelves in the press. The spare room is a wardrobe stacked with cardboard boxes.