The prints you laid – Gareth Culshaw

 

The coast elbowed the land

a sea came from afar

nudged the pebbles until they rolled.

 

We walked. Left a memory

in the road. I unclipped

the lead from my hand,

 

and you cut away the distance

between yourself and a gull.

 

I followed the earth’s golden dust

as you pounded the edge of land

and water.

 

An oystercatcher flicked up into the gulp.

I watched the sun on your fur

 

that carried light, put prints

in the sand before I got there.

 

I hope they’re still around to lead me

when I go back, alone.

 

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Gareth lives in Wales. He has two collections by FutureCycle, The Miner & A Bard’s View. He is a current student at Manchester Met.

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June 6, 2021June 6, 2021 by foxglovejournal Categories: Poetry, UncategorizedTags: coast, creative, creativity, distance, elements, Gareth Culshaw, light, loss, memory, movement, nature, past, pet, poem, Poetry, prints, road, sand, senses, sun, Wales, water, writing Leave a comment

Traces – Lorraine Carey

 

I have a friend

without fingerprints.

She worked in the corner shop

and the fact that her tips

lacked those delicate swirls

only came to light,

 

when takings didn’t tally

with receipts and the police

arrived to take prints.

Her innocence undisputed

and the culprit shown the door.

 

We said she was special,

unique, joked she’d make

a superb criminal,

with no evidence on door knobs,

or traces left behind,

 

tongues firmly in our cheeks

and elevated in an instant

she drifted from us

with our traceable whorls,

just ordinary girls,

nothing special.

 

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Lorraine Carey’s an Irish poet from Co. Donegal. Her work is widely published in Poetry Ireland Review, Abridged, The Rising Phoenix Review, Constellate, Orbis, Prole, Smithereens, Porridge, The High Window, The Honest Ulsterman and Poetry Birmingham among others. She has poems forthcoming in Eunoia Review and One. A Pushcart Prize nominee, she has been placed and shortlisted in several competitions including Trocaire / Poetry Ireland, The Blue Nib Chapbook Competition, Listowel Writers’ Week, The Allingham Prize and was longlisted in The National Poetry Competition 2019. Her poems have been broadcast on local and national radio. Her debut collection is From Doll House Windows (Revival Press).

March 22, 2021March 22, 2021 by foxglovejournal Categories: Poetry, UncategorizedTags: creative, creativity, discovery, Donegal, fingerprints, fingers, friend, friendship, innocence, Ireland, light, Lorraine Carey, memory, ordinary, poem, Poetry, prints, shop, swirls, traces, whorls, work, writing Leave a comment