A New Ulster Featuring the works of David McLean, Neil Ellman, Angela Topping, Nancy Anne Miller, Christopher Barnes, Stella Burton and more. Hard copies can be purchased for £5.00 Issue No 3 December 2012
Oct 30, 2014
A New
Ulster Featuring the works of David McLean, Neil Ellman, Angela Topping, Nancy Anne Miller, Christopher Barnes, Stella Burton and more. Hard copies can be purchased for £5.00
Issue No 3 December 2012
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A New Ulster Editor: Amos Greig
On the Wall Editor: Arizahn
Contents
Cover Image by Amos Greig
Editorial page 6
Nancy Anne Miller;
Tulips in January page 8
Boxing Day page 9
Mercy page 10
New Year page 11
Winter Landscape page 12
White Light page 13
David McLean;
Nothing Written page 15
Scars are never page 16
Ghost of a father page 17
Stormy Night page 18
The Dreadful Child page 19
Angela Topping;
Mage page 21
Spoken Cartography page 22
Christopher Barnes;
Theory of Alienation page 24
Moon Screams page 25
Fiscal Wars page 26
Puppeteers Croon page 27
Disorganising Revolution page 28
The New Politics are Dead page 29
Neil Ellman;
Of Course the Longing was Fabricated page 31
Elegy for a Silent God page 32
Spontaneous Combustion page 33
The haplesness of Being page 34
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Rena Rossner;
Edith in Wonderland page 36
Villette page 37
Eileen and Olive page 38
Kate Ashton;
Ebb (prose excerpt) page 40
Stella Burton;
Rain Circle page 46
From Day to Night page 47
Strandhill page 48
Portavogie Storms page 49
Portavogie page 50
The Storms and Fishermen's Families page 51
Dewdrops on Her Cheeks page 52
Young Writers and Artists Section
McKenna McClenny;
Snowy Butterflies page 54
On The Wall
Colin's artwork can be found on pages 58-59
Round the Back
Bare Hands Poetry page 60
The Bone Orchard page 61 Christmas message from the Alleycat's page 62
Manuscripts, art works and letters to be sent to the Editor @ 24 Tyndale Green Belfast BT14
8HH. Alternatively e-mail [email protected]. (See Submissions for further details.)
Hard copy distribution available via Dennis Greig c/o Lapwing Publications, 1 Ballysillan
Drive BT14 8HQ
Digital distribution is via links on our website https://sites.google.com/site/anewulster/
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Published in Baskerville Old Face
Produced in Belfast, Northern Ireland.
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Editorial
It is now December, the weather has started to turn and Christmas approaches like an
unstoppable wave of festive joy and untrammelled commerciality. A New Ulster is now three
issues in and this is the last issue of 2012 hard to fathom at times.
The last few years have seen some momentous changes occur worldwide. In many
countries the Arab Spring has seen a desire for freedom to choose and an escape from
oppression. People around the world find themselves opening their eyes to the realities of
society and the difficulties that lie ahead. The end of November saw a historic decision as
Palestine is recognized as a state by the UN. Hard to believe that just a few days before Gaza
had seen the increase in violence and bloodshed. Worryingly many community and artist
projects on the ground working towards peace faced the possibility of seeing their work
undone.
I have been asked "Amos? Why don't you feature your work in A New Ulster?" my
answer is very simple my work is on every page. I am responsible for the cover images I take
each photograph, I edit each page tweaking the layout as and when it needs it. I communicate
with each artist, writer and plan which order the content will appear in. A New Ulster is
ultimately a publication aimed at reaching as many people as possible, sharing poetry, fiction
and art with everyone no matter their creed or culture. A New Ulster is not a platform for my
own work but a vessel for others to get their work out there to be enjoyed. I have produced
plenty of my own work and several pieces have been in print in hard copy and online. I've
used paintings to raise funds for charity but this magazine is not about me as a writer or artist.
Issue three sees a new section added representing the works of younger artists and
writers. I believe that creativity and passion for the arts should be nurtured. I would like to
think that this will be a section that can be built on and expanded. I am also hopeful that we
will see 2013 as the year when STEAM becomes the norm at school and that we see an
increase in social and community art projects. What is STEAM? well it stands for science,
technology, art and maths we need to encourage the next generation to be thinkers and doers.
In a few short weeks it will be Christmas the towns and shops are already mad, flooded with
shoppers seeking the latest gadgets and the perfect present. I would like to take this time to
wish you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!
Amos Greig
Enough preamble! Onto the creativity!
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Biographical Note; Nancy Anne Miller is a
Bermudian poet, and has a MLitt from
the Univ. of Glasgow. “Somersault”, a
poetry collection about Bermuda is
forthcoming from Guernica
Editions(CA).Her poems have
appeared in Edinburgh Review (UK),
The International Literary Quarterly
(UK), Stand (UK), Mslexia (UK), The
Fiddlehead (CA), The Dalhousie Review
(CA), The Caribbean Writer (VI), Journal
of Caribbean Literatures (USA),
Postcolonial Text (CA)), and tongues of
the ocean (BS) among others with poems
forthcoming in Agenda
(UK) and The Moth (IE). She is a
MacDowell Colony Fellow and teaches
poetry workshops in Bermuda.
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Tulips in January
They bend as if colour is heavy to bear, the weight
Of worth as one stem brought a fortune in 1637 trade.
Still proud of that, even the light’s gold can’t get them
To open. Heads lowered like snakes uncharmed by music.
Held in a crystal vase the way winter holds us each
In glassy ice, surrounds us with what breaks, cracks,
Then sends the softness of snow. Petals open in slow
Motion, aspergillums sprinkle the room with a silence.
Undress for death, litter the table with taffeta skirt
Panels like crushed love letters, or painted nails.
Sepals, electrical plugs without the currency of the sun
Coursing through, spent from the charge of the moment.
Nancy Anne Miller
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Boxing Day
Out of the box finally,
Christmas day over,
Fall out bits of sparkle
Present from the gathering.
Advent a house party of sorts
In ancient days when adoring
Magi, Shepherds showed
When they could. An extra day
Necessary after aiming for
The one moment like the star
Over Bethlehem is a target.
When truly its light is
The jagged ripped paper
From a gift package. We
Need another 24 hours to put
The long year to sleep with
This bedtime story for both
Child, adult. Hear again
About the birth of a baby
Who opened up the world.
Nancy Anne Miller
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Mercy
Something good in the grey,
The dreary in between, a purgatorial smoke
Wafting between the burnt out death of autumn
And the birth and bright blaze of Christmas.
Everything calmly noticeable
In a low key way.
Nothing takes the eye to the horizon,
What is near is the focus.
So when white falls
Like light from heaven, we want it to,
So hungry for this piece of bread
Pushed through the bars of trees.
Nancy Anne Miller
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New Year
The dry brown leaves left
On the January trees remind
Me of the scrappy downed kites
Edwards, our gardener, and I
Made and retrieved amongst
The Bermuda cedars. Built
From fennel sticks, string,
Paste, and paper grocery
Bags from Lindley’s market
Until ready for steady winds.
The landscape in New England
Is now a patchy white and
Brown like the cows pasturing
At the ‘ Milfold’ estate in our
Island Paget neighbourhood.
The milky kindness of snow
Will fall here, bring back
A childhood innocence,
So we become infants again
With the spanking New Year.
Nancy Anne Miller
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Winter Landscape
The perfect metaphor for memory
Distilling, abstracting,
Simplifying what occurred.
When the truth is the melt
Down of what is underneath,
Odd shaped, patchy, not particularly clean.
We sift things through time,
Gentle white lies fall,
Sugar coat what is unseemly.
We remember in bits, fill in
In pieces. Our mind joggled,
A snow globe covering the scene.
Keep it neat, in a container on
Our desk, until we brave to enter
The winter landscape of this piece of paper.
Nancy Anne Miller
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White Light
Everything is converted as white light
Pours out of heaven and trees become
Thin ribbed angels who cannot
Lift droopy wings to fly. No need to go
Up when a celestial world comes down.
The town truck forms its own flapping
Feathery path to us. The steady snow
Fills all distances flown between,
Leaves arched branches, discarded
Scaffolding of flight no longer needed.
Footprints where messengers landed
With a gravitas now dissolve, fill in,
Buttonholes buttoned up as a cloak
Covers all of the land, is thrown
Down for only God to walk over.
Nancy Anne Miller
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Biographical note:
David McLean is from Wales but has lived in
Sweden since 1987. He lives there with his
partner, 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 shortly. More
information about David McLean can be found at
his blog http://mourningabortion.blogspot.com/
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nothing written
nothing is written in the skin
that carries meaning,
a palimpsest layered
with incessant absences
replacing one another
because everybody loves
repetition and repetitive rejection:
so nothing is written in the skin
to read out loud to this night
where nothing listens,
where no birds sing
David McLean
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scars are never
scars are never memory
or too importunate, the itch singing
in the insignificant and dusty skin
plowed by time and anxiety
through the glorious missing,
the sweaty dead things
living still. here is ice
and night and undone sun
so everything lives
diamonds and night
because scars are never mistakes;
just time cut right
David McLean
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ghost of a father
a girl in an old gray house
dozing in a chair,
she wears the ghost of her father
like a shirt
though cameras are there
and every empty
potential: ghouls
and ironing boards
or an innocent script;
a girl in an old gray house.
she wears the ghost of her father
like any other inanimate thing,
a camera, a corpse that sings
David McLean
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stormy night
it is a stormy night in a film,
but here the lightning has long been sleepy
and only the wind to whip ice or waves
happy.
it is a confused child in a film
carrying her burden of ghosts,
but here there have never been ghosts in me
and childhood is a forgotten century
to leave in a dusty box in a cellar hole,
a hopeless ghost broken and lonely,
another drug like memory.
it is a stormy night in a film
it is animals and everything living,
a stormy life for ghosts and children
David McLean
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the dreadful child
the dreadful child has ghosts in her eyes
and a pocket full of hopeless blood
immoderate like love might have been
or soldiers on an arrogant hill
rehearsing for living
and the brutal exigencies of will
the dreadful child has eyes on fire,
she is sleeping still
David McLean
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Biographical note: Angela Topping is
based in Cheshire and her ninth solo
poetry publication, Paper Patterns,
came out from Lapwing in 2012.
Angela is proud of her Irish working
class ancestry, which informs her
writing. in 2013, she takes up a
residency at Gladstone's Library,
Harwarden. She has written several
critical books and textbooks and is
currently completing a book on the
poet, John Clare.
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Mage
I was once a hare, could bounce across a field,
my long ears flowing behind me, my eyes telescopes.
Or was I a fish? A freckled trout in a brown stream.
When water moves me without hurry in my body’s rhythms
I believe this. I also accept I was a bird,
the common garden kind, that loves to make a nest.
I still long for flight, to see the land laid out,
map-like in all its glowing colours after rain.
I must have been a shape-shifter, a pale dark-haired woman
who could rise up from my other bodies
become whatever I needed to be, to defeat the wizard
who wanted to tie me down and know all my secret names.
Angela Topping
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Spoken Cartography
What is the riddle of this hill?
It tells of secret graves, of bones.
It sings of granite, rabbits’ homes.
Records of battles are scribbled on grass.
Blood fattens bulbs for spring.
What is the legend of this tree?
The heartwood knows important things.
Its shade is where the lovers sighed;
Its branches where thrushes feed their young.
The oak means ships and England’s pride.
What is the codex of the sky?
Its meaning changes by the hour.
Its tongue no-one can understand.
Its daily dialectic tells one truth:
Nothing is definite except the dark.
Angela Topping
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Biography: Some bio details...
in 1998 I won a Northern Arts writers award. In July 200 I read at
Waterstones bookshop to promote the anthology 'Titles Are Bitches'.
Christmas 2001 I debuted at Newcastle's famous Morden Tower doing a
reading of my poems. Each year I read for Proudwords lesbian and gay
writing festival and I partake in workshops. 2005 saw the publication of
my collection LOVEBITES published by Chanticleer Press, 6/1 Jamaica
Mews, Edinburgh.
On Saturday 16Th August 2003 I read at the Edinburgh Festival as a Per
Verse poet at LGBT Centre, Broughton St.
I also have a BBC web-
page www.bbc.co.uk/tyne/gay.2004/05/section_28.shtml and http://www.b
bc.co.uk/tyne/videonation/stories/gay_history.shtml (if first site does not
work click on SECTION 28 on second site.
Christmas 2001 The Northern Cultural Skills Partnership sponsored me
to be mentored by Andy Croft in conjunction with New Writing North.
I made a radio programme for Web FM community radio about my
writing group. October-November 2005, I entered a poem/visual image
into the art exhibition The Art Cafe Project, his piece Post-Mark was
shown in Betty's Newcastle. This event was sponsored by Pride On The
Tyne. I made a digital film with artists Kate Sweeney and Julie Ballands
at a film making workshop called Out Of The Picture which was shown at
the festival party for Proudwords, it contains my poem The Old Heave-
Ho. I worked on a collaborative art and literature project called How
Gay Are Your Genes, facilitated by Lisa Mathews (poet) which exhibited
at The Hatton Gallery, Newcastle University, including a film piece by the
artist Predrag Pajdic in which I read my poem On Brenkley St. The
event was funded by The Policy, Ethics and Life Sciences Research
Institute, Bio-science Centre at Newcastle's Centre for Life. I was
involved in the Five Arts Cities poetry postcard event which exhibited at
The Seven Stories children's literature building. In May I had 2006 a solo
art/poetry exhibition at The People's Theatre why not take a look at their
website http://ptag.org.uk/whats_on/gallery/recent_exhbitions.htm
The South Bank Centre in London recorded my poem "The Holiday I
Never Had", I can be heard reading it
on www.poetrymagazines.org.uk/magazine/record.asp?id=18456
REVIEWS: I have written poetry reviews for Poetry Scotland and Jacket
Magazine and in August 2007 I made a film called 'A Blank Screen, 60
seconds, 1 shot' for Queerbeats Festival at The Star & Shadow Cinema
Newcastle, reviewing a poem...see www.myspace.com/queerbeatsfestival
On September 4 2010, I read at the Callander Poetry Weekend hosted
by Poetry Scotland. I have also had art criticism published in Peel and
Combustus magazines.
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Theory Of Alienation
A popgun gaffer rolls his own,
Rattles the supplement, self-tormenting on Magners
Before cues, pots,
All cramped swagger
And Lynx.
At the urinal
A trap-door spider’s hatching
Tenterhooks. Wincing. Close upon an affront.
3pm splutters….hang fire sun.
Car park boot sale: booths vending whim-wham lighters,
Foolscap redeemed from a work-a-day nook,
Crates of marked-down bleach
To gnaw the eyes,
Make them faintly cry.
Christopher Barnes
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Moon Screams
A quadrangle has lungs
Waking midnight.
Cosmology ridging,
Mouse-stirring grass.
The coup shoots ahead.
Embedding ‘elections,’
Both parties
Puffing on ‘divine right’ boards,
Swaggerish. Rank –
Knocking out the moment.
Teeth-gnashing,
A blush across flesh.
Bedraggled, trembling –
We flap in the web.
Christopher Barnes
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Fiscal Wars
I leered as false-teachings contorted.
Alterants said ‘nothing doing’.
Social Provision hurly-burlyed in turn-arounds,
Demolished, end-to-end in smoke.
Destiny will heir, as every Marxist apprehends,
A head-and-shoulders phalanx of police.
We’ll prolong our inductions
In unlikely circumstances,
Surviving a formula of motives.
They’ll allocate begin-again dearths,
Vehement anxiety for diversion – an escapade
Lengthening to sparkling hearses.
Christopher Barnes
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Puppeteer’s Croon
Cliqued in the finesse
Of bestowing decrees, I swallow it
Wanting gripe.
Soaked up by long-in-tooth conventions,
Machinations smart-arsing the no-accounts.
Righto, you structure by hush-hushes,
Floodlight defects.
Kick off the coming bloodshed.
You made trap-doors alright;
In the sewer try bobbing along.
Christopher Barnes
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Disorganising Revolution
Inconsiderate – your Simian good looks,
Strew in knock-kneed rain. Convictions
Of ‘tactics’ gist –
Someone’s tackling to string-pull
The Schism.
War is a gargled-earth malodour.
Muffled drum. The matter of daring,
A bare anthropological index.
Christopher Barnes
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The New Politics Are Dead
Right path whores
With pit-a-pat scowls
Had flesh that made thunder certain.
Sprung, seven senses – they’ll tangle you
In the eye.
We’re divided from gallows.
Unreplenished of possessions.
Smuggled banners jolt.
Dishevelled see-saw resistance
Death rattles treading damp steps
Set forward by the living.
Christopher Barnes
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.
Biographical note: Twice nominated
for Best of the Net, Neil Ellman lives
and writes in New Jersey. Hundreds of
his poems appear in print and online
journals, anthologies, broadsides and
chapbooks throughout the world. Neil
currently lives in New Jersey
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Of Course the Longing Was Fabricated
(after the painting by Ashly Wood)
this longing
skin of skin on skin
this hunger
wrongly conceived
this misunderstanding
of limbs
eyes that linger too long
from dark within
taut nerves
ready to shatter
this improbable love
fabricated from
a touch—
“Of course,” persisting
“Of course,” I said,
pretending all along
that it was real
Neil Ellman
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Elegy for a Silent God
Our hearts Inflamed by love of you
through pestilence and plague
silent mornings when your voice
was stiller than the wind through grass
your wind, we the grass,
bursting with adoration, green
with humility and praise
we bent to your wind without a word
not knowing is more difficult than pain
waiting more difficult than shame
we honored, we offered ascent
and suffered from undying consent
and still the wait, not even with the wind
hurling the deserts at our doors—
millennia of worship on bloodied knees
and still the locusts come.
Neil Ellman
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Spontaneous Combustion
flames have hands
touch souls’ emptiness
conspire
fingers curled
nails scratching
igniting heart
the hyacinth within
knows heat
remorse
hands know no reproach
feelings
burn inside
not so far
where they can hide
before they turn to fire
Neil Ellman
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The Haplessness of Being
hapless
In another
universe
hopeless
In this
things happen
unintended
consequences
unforeseen
cursed
jinxed
damned
a reprobate
here
on earth
I wonder why
the stars
were crossed
for me
before
I was ever
born
Neil Ellman
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Rena Rossner is a graduate of the Writing
Seminars program at The Johns Hopkins
University, Trinity College Dublin and McGill
University. She has written extensively for The Jerusalem Report and The Jerusalem
Post. Her poetry and short fiction has been
published or is forthcoming from Poetica
Magazine, Ascent Aspirations, The 22 Magazine, Fade Poetry Journal, Exterminating
Angel Press and Inclement Poetry Magazine,
among others. Her first novel is out on
submission.
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Edith in Wonderland
At Egerton House School, Exeter
Alice was handed over. Not down
the rabbit hole, this wonderland
is leather bound, gilt framed,
embossed with gold.
In 1923 or 24, hearts
were lifted, Sursum Corda declared
to Edith Le Palowel, the little miss,
Form II. Who excelled
in English subjects,
this was her prize.
Head Mistress Blanche J.G.
Gardiner, your gift is now
mine to command
with full color plates.
The preface poem begins again
“All in the golden afternoon”
and ends, as this volume does
“Pluck’d in a far-off land.”
Rena Rossner
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Villette
I found Villette in Howarth for
three English pounds.
Inscribed.
My souvenir from Bronteland.
A blue binding engraved with art
nouveau roses, its threadbare stem’s
gold leaf pattern long-since worn thin.
Inside beside the pencilled-in price
it said:
To Ina From Will.
His letters grazed four tiny lines
he scored with care
prescribed
to stop hand-writing’s slant. In black
fountain pen ink he sketched
his heart, carefully retraced
W’s second U. Perhaps he meant to woo,
or win her hand?
That day, so much was left
unsaid.
March 29. My birthday, 1914.
Will’s boyish inscription
described the day,
85 years ago.
Were Villette and Ina torn apart?
Was she abandoned
for another suitor’s books?
Villete, my twin,
what will become of you
when I
am dead?
Rena Rossner
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Eileen and Olive
To Eileen with love
you signed her name a bit
too crooked, crossed out one L,
realized too late
her name had only one.
And I wonder which
of The Girls’ Budget
stories were your favourite,
such that you made them hers.
Which “riches in a little room”
were found within
the pages of this book,
as the fig-leaf imprint
on the second page proclaims.
“To Bathe or Not to Bathe?”
That’s the first story.
Or was your interest piqued
by “How Jennifer raised the Wind.”
I’m partial to “Mab
and Moonshine,”
were you too?
And in your jagged child
script, a contrast to the brazen
font which said:
BLACKIE AND SON LIMITED,
LONDON GLASGOW AND BOMBAY
you signed
with Love from Olive
1924.
Rena Rossner
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Biographical Note:
Kate Ashton trained first a s a nurse and
then went into nursing journalism. She
returned home to Scotland in 2003 after
spending 25 years in the Netherlands,
where she worked as a freelance editor
and translator and had two books
published in the ancient Frisian language.
The full-length prose poem from which
this extract comes was written mainly
during this period, and finished after
moving to a small town on the edge of the
Moray Firth. Kate’s work has appeared in
various magazines, including Shearsman,
THE SHOp, Envoi and Northwords
Now. Her pamphlet, The Concourse of
Virgins, came out from Lapwing
Publications in May this year.
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Ebb
Looking back, I see the house was back and white, a Tudor monument upon a darkened hill. I
smell the yew tree’s blacked boughs and see the high dark arc they threw and how beneath
them nothing grew.
Esther was inside, I knew. But first there was the long gravel drive, flowerless, and then the big
front door, a hall, and then the panelled dining rom. Esther sat in the window seat and lozenges
of light stole in upon her through locked panes of lead.
Against the diamond hatch I saw the fair haze of her hair and in the tiger-yellow eyes an ancient
glance of welcome and of stealth. The day began there, in those eyes and in that fall of hair,
and in the wary withdrawal our meeting held. When Esther smiled all excess fled.
I have no photograph of her.
She sidled from her seat and came across the polished pockmarked floor with arms
outstretched in some wide gesture not her own. And yes, her mother stood condoning there
behind her in the doorway; her mother, small and smelling bad.
Esther hugged me and the day began again. It was always like that: a furtive exchange of
openings without deceit and then a journey begun and never finishing. Not ended yet. Esther
smiled and cruelty, finality was in that smile, the small white weasel sharpness of her teeth;
something was limited in such sweetness, the soft curtailment of the saint.
But in those days there was no end to play. We chased oblivion into the farthest corner of the
house, the great dark hall, the echoing stairwell. And in the garden, scared to death, found
relics half-buried, graveyard-green: a gone child’s ball, a bald doll’s head twisted and gawping
on its neck.
One Christmas my small sister stayed there.
Esther had an older brother, John, and older brothers should be big and tall and strong. But
this brother was shy, and when he spoke stumbled so that you could not rescue him. He played
at the piano with a deep bowing motion of his trunk and a slight frown. Turning, his smile was
slight and vague as summer rain. It passed across his face like summer rain.
He plays again. The room is full of light, and pictures punctuate the walls. There is a coloured
rug, a coffee table and a chair – a special chair of slung hide with sagging leather belts for arms
adjustable on buttoned holes, like those which held up the windows in old Pullman train
carriages. And the seat is a real tiger pelt, tanned naked in parts but curling lush where each
limb joined and crested black from head to tail.
Esther sat on her father’s knee. There was no need. She had not hurt herself. She was no
longer small. He spoke in slow stammering speech and near to his left eye a tiny muscle
twitched. He put her gently down and stood, half man half megalith, blond, balding, blinking
behind his black-rimmed spectacles.
He was an architect. But not a Frank Lloyd Wright, caught in the canyon, defenceless, lanced
with light, working with wonders, falling, failing, coalescing. This was another kind of man, who
42
could not be moved. His massive frame rendered him impassable and at his soul some
trembling weakness charged his tongue with tears, his eyes with long unspoken lies.
We shall not, we shall not be moved.
We shall not, we shall not be moved. Just like a tree that stands beside the water We shall not be moved.
One day Esther’s cousin Anthony came. Esther and I went out with him to the potting shed
beneath the yews. Here it was dark and damp and when you closed the door it was at last as
though no one could see. To be unseen, to be invisible; it was a highest aim, a secret which
heavied our hearts and widened our eyes, which whispered stopped our breath. It was almost
completely dark in there.
And darkness made us daring, so that all the dark mysteries stirred and asked to be explored;
the black suspicions that each harboured about himself, and the frightening bright light that
each was to the other. Our silence was not the dread quietus of the adult world, but a still
potent promise of tomorrow, the stricken moment which while fleeing sank and touched each
at his core.
A quiver went through us then and anything could happen. Witches could swoop, walls
crumble; a hundred visions show themselves and manifest some being. The shared universe
could speak to us. Time spilled and overlapped itself. Difference took on tangible dimension,
and difference thrilled.
Cousin Anthony, sly and superior, showed how he could stand and pee into the cobweb
shadows of the shed. Shocked and hot with pride, I pinched and peed too, in a straight line.
But Esther froze. Something had entered on this game, and from outside. She shrank and
suddenly was absent from our ring. Her fear was like a parent come upon us without words,
and as she shivered rank and stained their strange pronouncements filled the air. Anthony
would be blamed.
Tell-tale tit, Your mother can’t knit, Your father can’t walk With a walking stick.
*
But Anthony’s father walked in front, stooped, bearded and myopic, in a dark duffle-coat. A
professor, he walked alongside priests and leftwing politicians. Behind them came trades
unions, local peace-corps and endless representatives, their women carrying, chivvying children.
The war had caught these people up and kissed each with its deadly kiss. It had dandled them
on its knee and they had smelled the acrid breath it breathed across the earth. It had lifted
them up, each, to see the rising cloud, the mushroom mask of liberty, and let them peep
beneath its skirts at scars more permanent and terrible than death. They were afraid.
But in their fear lay perspicacity. Children of Plato, brought up on reasoning, they saw the need
to organise. They found new fathers in philosophers, prophets and pacific priests and a new
forum on the streets. Although afraid, they did not need to be alone.
43
Those soldiers who had survived marched, marched now with their wives. Here were the raw
young captains who had played at war beneath garish colonial suns, or stayed at home and
objected in solitary shame.
The war had shattered their young lives (and yet there had been something fine: the barrack
room of equal boys, jokes in the mess. They told the tales with wistful carelessness, propped
against bars behind their women’s backs and camaraderie was blessed.)
England had mostly held the war at bay. All the abandonment with which she embraced hate
sprang from an island temperament. Lulled through the summer of the concentration camp
her lovely landscape drowsed boundlessly free, and in her cities no one starved, but ate their
rations listlessly. And outrage met the doodlebugs arrested hum, the siren signalling attack.
What insolent would stray so far? Who dare to raze this temple state?
The majesty with which she orchestrated war was great. Exiled, the European queen and
government found hospitality commensurate, while commoners were dubbed and deprecated
as the Hun. No people better knew their equal or subordinate; found instant confirmation in
his bearing, dress or fate. To seek asylum here was to find refuge in the lair.
For ages immemorial the beech had congregated here, crowning these hills, the oak had
sprawled magnificent and valleys run their course towards the sea. England had long subdued
her Celtic kin and her dominion stretched as far as she could see. She made a monster of her
enemy and went to war with hoards of awe-struck allies, silenced, laying down their lands. She
pounced and brawled across the globe and grew more elegant with each foray.
Twice now she’d met her counterpart in war and vanquished him. She knew him like a lover,
had by heart each pose, each odd inflection of his speech. They were precisely matched, and
yet she never saw her true reflection in his eyes. The crucial moment passed and proud,
fastidious, she put away his broken reach.
At first they’d engaged hand to hand and knew that they were of one blood. They’d lain as
fellows cheek to cheek, and lay still now along a lowland shore, contrite in death as turtledoves,
releasing poets to the stars. But as their voices dimmed the savagery began again with weapons
greater than before, and man was lost within his game of war. He felt no foe, he smelt no fear-
he knew no touch of ice upon his soul. The numberless were one.
All passion past, their cities spoiled and hideous and poison seeping in their genes, they sowed
new seeds of angst and lust. Children came out to play on streets of tangled steel and dust. Pink
rosebay willow-herb attired the ruins with impartial haste and beauty throve amidst the waste.
Nothing was left to the twin combatants but lies, and they were satisfied. A maniac had led their
age. It was agreed on either side.
They built again with vigour born of rage. The defeated raised replicas in denial, the free built
fresh altars to their liberty. All respect for the past was gone; the sacred nature of the stone and
angles aimed at perfection. Unable to look back or mourn, they hid in hate and nothing new
was born.
44
Remembrance flourished in this state; ritual review of the facts and feigned, fantastical, the
ceremony of the flame. It held them flickering, ever still. Eternally it burned: the grisly image
stupefying will.
While ever closer families grew. Fraternities linked lovingly in arms. Nations declared their
shared intent for peace and clove the fallen prince in two.
Only the atom shook them now. This was a splitting which defied their law – a schism
separating cause and war. They watched the macerated face, the voiceless death with mutant
shock which amassed and manifest as perfidy. At last it seemed the war had ended with due
gravity.
But such horror must never touch their shore.
One, two…
Anthony’s father laid aside his lifework on the Doomsday Book. He lit a pipe and sat back in
his chair. It was quite clear whose was what and what belonged where. He saw a time when
man would once more labour on the land and forfeit feudalism for egalitarian content. Beyond
the botched ideal he glimpsed self-government, the lordless village coterie. Though plainly
there must first be peace.
He kept his vision largely to himself and peered around the circle of his fellow dons without
delight. He found more lasting pleasure in his wife, who succumbed wildly to his dallying with
clerks and repaid him well with berating, a final child; the flashing topaz splendour of her eyes.
Three, four… They marched with her brother, the architect. Brother and sister, both were big, but she was
dark while he was fair. She stood on certainties, he floundered in the shallows of his own
misdeeds; she bellowed curses at the world, he whispered and withdrew. He knew she loathed
the constant clamour of his wife, her talk, her endless chattering; the way she shrugged and
covered up the diminution of her size.
…we don’t want No nuclear war.
Among the little men walked my father. His history stretched back to northern armies of the
unemployed and cloth-capped orators on street corners. He held the learned in contempt, yet
found this current kinship good. Poverty, squalor, these he knew. But to hold sway with those
who had long been to school was a departure from the rule.
Five, six… There had been those after the war who’d viewed the benefactor without joy, who’d seen in
gifts and charity the subtle workings of a ploy. The young American who’d blanched at banks
of living dead welcoming him with batty arms outspread trembling took all his terror home. His
folks heaped pity on the boy and sent out aid. Who knew what chance, what interest might
accrue.
45
Such patronage fell foul of the proud, led spirits back to long-forgotten indignities. They
scorned such tainted recompense. Glittering at the limit of their view lay galaxies of unclaimed
stars, while menacing, material and fain, nuclear night knocked at their door. They overcame
such scruples as remained and made the common cause their own.
Seven, eight… Back in the ranks the simple victim of his time walked with the woman who had shared his
crime.
Passive resistance was the order of the day. Aggression must be countered with restraint.
Inflamed by civil disobedience, plain citizens and policemen lined the way. The marchers went
from town to town, aloof, undaunted by abuse, and entering the capital bypassed with sneers
their cordoned governors.
Why don’t we negotiate?
The great grey square was filled with cheers. Massive, the maned stone lions bore the throng.
The granite lips of basins swelled. Fountains ran red and people swam. Speeches were
drowned within the song
We shall overcome, We shall overcome, We shall overcome some day, ay, ay, ay, ay - Oh deep in my heart I do believe We shall overcome some day.
ends excerpt
46
Biographical Note: Stella Burton was a vibrant
person. Many of her pieces were designed for
the oral tradition ranging from spoken word to
songs. Christy Moore was a popular influence as
was her love of walking and for the garden that
she maintained. Her final years were spent in
Portavogie with her husband Roy and she wrote
a selection of stories about the storms there. In
many ways she captured the old story teller
traditions and many of her pieces really came to
life when she performed them.
Stella Burton 1946 - 2010
47
Rain Circle
It trickles down my window, tiny drops of rain
Down the ledge, along the path rushing through the drain,
Gurgling and swallowing, in and out of the pipes it shivers,
Finally splashing, dashing out into the rivers.
The journey here it does not end
The river it has many bends.
Twisting here and curling there running wild without a care
Over rocks and under bridges.
By the fields and through the ditches,
Then it comes out to the sea, but alas it is not free
For it must return to clouds and sky
And wet our windows when they are dry.
Stella Burton
48
From Day to Night
The cornfield stands so still and golden in the summer sun
Wavering for just a moment,
A light breeze passes on.
Then when the breeze has travelled to the field beyond
Once more the corn stands still on that lovely summer morn.
A small bird in flight goes twittering past,
Travelling to its nest.
It has flown quite far today
And returns to nest.
The flowers and trees look splendid stretching
In the sundrenched park.
What a pity it will all be gone soon
And we shall be left with only the dark.
Stella Burton
49
Strandhill
(A place of the heart)
Early in the morning as I watch the sunshine rise
up above Benbulben and the Knocknarea skies.
As I walk along the beaches of a place they call Strandhill
a little seaside village of which I'll never get my fill.
Oh Strandhill I love you dearly
As you nestle quietly down
Among the lovely mountains
To the west of Sligo town.
You can watch the great white breakers as they beat unto the sand
of the great Atlantic ocean, there is none that's quite so grand
and if you'll cross the sand dunes and walk a little way
you will come upon Cullenamore strand a quiet peaceful bay.
Oh Strandhill I love you dearly
As you nestle quietly down
Among the lovely mountains
To the west of Sligo town.
There are local friendly people who ride their horses there
and canter little ponies and a lovely dark brown mare
and if you're very lucky as you gaze across the tides
you will see the dolphins break the waves
and reach towards the skies.
Oh Strandhill I love you dearly
As you nestle quietly down
Among the lovely mountains
To the west of Sligo town.
Stella Burton
50
Portavogie Storms
The wind howls over Billy's hill
The rain blatters my windowsill
I look towards the harbour wall
Giant waves down they fall
The fishing boats are sailing out
But it's much to stormy someone shouts
Still the fishermen go by
Ever watching the cloudy sky
The sea is very unforgiving
But the fishermen must make their living
They may not know what lies ahead
Still children and families must be fed.
Stella Burton
51
Portavogie
The little green light is shining bright
To guide the ships throughout the night.
The sun shines red in the western sky
And so it sets and says good bye.
It's a cold northwind that blows today,
I think that there is some snow on the way.
Close in the hens for safety in the byre,
Chop up the logs and stoke the fire.
The kids eat their dinner with fierce appetite,
And now they're all asleep
Settled down for the night.
Stella Burton
52
The Storms and Fishermen's Families
It starts with a whisper around the eaves
Then a rustle in the trees,
Palmtrees bend towards the ground,
Grannie sits with a worried frown.
She has heard these storms before,
Of the stories of the fishermen
not far from shore.
Will they make it home tonight?
She wonders.
Through the monstrous tide, the lightning,
And the thunder.
She is thinking about times long before
When she was a young girl,
Out on the shore.
Her baby was kicking her belly well
When the waves began to swell.
Will he make it back home
to see his bairn?
Who cares about the stinking heron
Is that the light she sees on the stern?
She's running now
More than she should!
But as she rounds the pier the news
is good,
The father to be there he stands
Glad to be back safe on dry land.
Stella Burton
53
Dewdrops on Her Cheeks
She didn't want to leave
Cause she was having such a time
But she could hardly speak
And there were dewdrops on her cheeks.
Her Grampa said don't cry
And she tried to say goodbye
But she could hardly speak
And there were dewdrops on her cheeks.
No she didn't want to go
And she cried the whole way home
It took her mama all the week
To wipe those dewdrops from her cheeks.
That little fair haired girl
Aideen is her name
She will win the hearts of many
As she plays life's waiting game.
Stella Burton
54
Biographical Note: McKenna McClenny is
twelve years old. She is an avid reader and a fine
artist. She was born in Amarillo Tx and lives
there still..
Young Writers and Artists section
55
Snowy Butterflies
Snowy Butterflies
Watch them as they flutter-by,
So wonderful and free,
Oh what I'd give to just be
A snowy butterfly
Twirling swirling doing flips,
Taking many, many trips,
Going up into the clouds
The falling floating back to earth
When they're tired and have done their best,
They slowly land upon the ground to get some rest
Then they fly back up to dance again
I put on my gloves,
I put on my boots
And I go and dance with them,
Those snowy butterflies.
McKenna 'Mac' McClenny
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: [email protected] 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”.
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! You can also order hard copies of “A New Ulster” signed by the
Editor himself for the bargain price of just £5.00 per copy for black and white, £7.00 for full colour (plus P&P).
Watch out however, as numbers will be limited. If you would like to purchase a copy or three (hey, I’m feeling
optimistic today!), then please contact us with the details of your order via e-mail at: [email protected] and title
your message as follows: Purchase request (name of customer here).
57
DECEMBER 2012’S MESSAGE FROM THE ALLEYCATS:
Thanks to all of the artists who submitted their work to be
presented “On the Wall”. As you probably noticed, we now have a
section especially for younger writers and artists. Be sure and let any up
and coming creative types know! In addition, our editorial is now at the
front of the artwork section. 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”.
Well, that’s just about it from us for this edition everyone.
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year from the Alleycats; see you all
again in the January edition!
58
Biographical note:
Born at the tail end of the seventies in Northern Ireland,
Colin Dardis is a poet, artist, and sometimes musician.
He edits FourXFour, an online journal focusing on
poetry from Ireland and beyond. He is also the founder
of Purely Poetry, an open mike poetry night in Belfast.
Colin’s work has been previously in numerous
anthologies, journals and zines in Ireland, the UK and
the USA.
Check out Colin's website at:
http://lowlightsforlowlifes.weebly.com/
Fanbook Fan Page:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Colin-
Dardis/173153172766394
Speech Therapy Poetry Zine:
http://speechtherapypoetry.weebly.com/
59
"Maid" by Colin Dardis
"Redface" by Colin Dardis
60
"Stoneface" by Colin Dardis
61
Bare Hands
Bare Hands is an international online journal of contemporary poetry and photography started
by Kerrie O’Brien in October 2011 with the aim of creating an online journal that was both
visually striking and easy to read.
As there are already a huge number of well-established and impressive Irish journals such as
the Stinging Fly, The Poetry Bus and The First Cut, Kerrie wanted to create an international
collection. She also wanted something with a quick turnaround so that people wouldn’t be left
waiting too long for a response. Kerrie decided that ten poems and five photographs would be
featured each month and the layout would ensure that the reader focused on each piece of
work individually. She told writing.ie “I’d never used Tumblr before but their blog themes are
beautiful, easy to use and designed to be read easily on mobile and tablet devices. So I started a
Facebook account and put out a submission call on poetry blogs and websites. The results were
startling. From the beginning, the poetry and photography I received were of an incredibly high
standard and work was being sent from all over the world – China, India, Russia, Malta – it was
amazing. Sarah Griffin became my fellow editor and within a few months the journal was
getting a huge amount of views and it kept growing.
Each issue now reaches over a thousand hits within a few days of publication, which I still can’t
really believe. Because the quality of the work in each issue was so strong and word about it
kept spreading, we decided to launch a competition that would promote the journal and its
artists in a bigger way. The idea was that two winning poems and photographs would be turned
into two beautifully designed postcards and distributed to independent bookshops around the
world where people could pick them up for free.
And that’s what we did.
They are now available all across the world in bookshops including Shakespeare and Co. in
Paris, City Lights in San Francisco, Foyles in London, St Mark’s Bookstore in New York as
well as ones in Melbourne, Toronto, Berlin and even Santorini. The winning and highly
commended work is published on our website and it is stunning.
Ever since the creation of Bare Hands people have enquired about the possibility of a print
edition, and we’ve decided we are going to create a print anthology, coming out in October
2012 to celebrate Bare Hand’s first birthday.
We’ve launched a Fundit campaign, so we’ll join the epic ranks of Storymap and The Poetry
Bus. We hope readers will look at it as just buying a copy of the anthology in advance – if they
pledge a meagre eight euro, they’re guaranteed a copy of the book to be sent for free. We’ve
other plans in store for the kind people who donate more than this such as a tiny little book of
62
Bare Hands photographs, stickers and even gin! This first print venture is going to mark an
important change in Bare Hands, and our second year is going to be full of surprises that are
already under way.
Submissions for the anthology are now open. So, while we get our Fundit campaign up and
running, write us some poetry and take some photographs! Our deadline is September 1st
2012 – that gives you loads of time. We will be publishing 15 photographs and 25 poems
altogether. It’ll be amazing! All contributors will receive two copies of the print journal. *Review submitted by Bare Hand Poetry. Anyone who is interested in submitting work to Bare Hand Poetry
should contact the editor on: [email protected] with the heading Anthology submissions.
Bone Orchard Poetry-
The name ‘Bone Orchard’ came from a line in a poem I had written long ago, almost
forgotten. I afterwards discovered that it was also a name of a post- punk group from the States,
I believe, from sometime in the early 80’s, around ‘The Birthday Party’ era; I added ‘poetry’, as
it seemed to fit. It began as a whim, as in my few years of submitting to zines and magazines, I
felt that I had scarce outlets that truly ‘fitted’ my own work, and that a lot of writers that I knew
seemed to be dissatisfied by what was about; basically they took what they could find. I had
edited previously at ‘Calliope Nerve’, under the wing of Nobius Black, who of course deserves
a mention, as Bone Orchard Poetry is run in a similar manner, ie. the frequency of posts and
absence of an ‘official’ issue, just a rolling basis, which I feel keeps things fresh.
As far as the work that is sought, I focus mainly on the somewhat darker aspects of the psyche:
the surreal/ the experimental/ the bleak/ the absurd, but I am receptive to other work, this is
not a ‘genre’ project. I have been blessed with the work that has been submitted, both from
friends and also from beyond, and have been surprised by the response, and the feedback.
Bone Orchard Poetry now runs to the 13,000 view mark since late last January, including a two
month hiatus. I have been lucky to have the work of David McLean/ Gillian Prew/ Craig
Podmore/ Heller Levinson/ John W. Sexton/ Kyle Hemmings/ Misti Rainwater Lites and so
many others, the list is endless, really, and I don’t mean to name-check. The quality of work, I
feel, is up there with the best zines, regardless of it being a ‘blog-zine’, etc. To be honest, I
hadn’t envisioned its success to be so great, nor the work to be so forthcoming as it has been.
If anyone feels they might have something that might fit the bill, the doors are always open, I
publish four times weekly, sometimes five, and you work WILL be read, that’s a given at this
stage…
I look forward to reading your work.
*Review submitted by Micheal Mc Aloran. Anyone who is interested in submitting work to Bone Orchard Poetry
should check out http://www.boneorchardpoetry.blogspot.ie for details
63
64
LAPWING PUBLICATIONS
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9781907276798 Martin Domleo The Haunted Barn: A Novella
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9781907276842 James O’Sullivan Kneeling on the Redwood Floor
9781907276859 Una ni Cheallaigh Salamander Crossing
9781907276866 Teresa Lally Doll
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9781907276927 Gillian Somerville-Large Karamania
9781907276934 Martha Rowsell Another Journey Like This
9781907276941 Kate Ashton The Concourse of Virgins
9781907276958 Martin Domleo Sheila
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9781907276972 John O’Malley Invisible Mending
9781907276989 J.C.Ireson The Silken Ladder
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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
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9781909252080 The Non Herein - Michael McAloran
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