OUR LITTLE RAFT.

In a sea of dinghy's and oil tankers and sleek motorboats,
Your love is like a raft.
Some people float past clutching on to tree beaches
Some lie at the bottom of the sea.

Our little raft works tirelessly to keep me afloat
Even if sometimes water leaks in through little holes
And our toes do get wet.

Occasionally, someone in a shiny sailing boat
Or purring motor vessel
Has called to me and invited me aboard.
Jump ship !
We have caviar.
But I wouldn't leave you and I and out dear little raft.

You brought me the foundations
The sturdy driftwood and rusty nails
The soiled rags and the old broomstick we use as a mast
And I showed you how to patch it together.
We sanded and oiled and scrubbed and hammered and patched
Then stood back to admire our dear little raft
And rode the windy seas.

I once mistakenly hammered a nail into your thumb
When trying to show you how to piece things back together.
Salt and blood mixed in the wind
As I tore off a strip of the ragged sail to compensate for my mistakes.

You once tripped and keeled overboard
In the midst of a storm.
I was barely there
Grasping at sea foam and trilling your name
Violently sick at the thought of the raft and I at sea without you.

But you emerged coughing and splattering from the waves
I hoisted you aboard, where you sat dripping and shaking.
We still don't mention that day.

And then the time that we so bitterly argued
Against the biting winds.
You threatened to dismantle all that you had brought and built
And take your seaworn driftwood with you.

We floated in silence for a few hours
Side by side
Before you splashed some water my way.
Let's not fight
Is all it took to get us back aboard.

Then there was the one day that I saw an island.
I thought of leaving our dear little raft
And swimming off to a quieter paradise
But something of your familiar silhouette against the moonlight
And the lapping of the sea against the worn timber frame
Made me stay.

MEETING IN THE SPACE BETWEEN DREAMS.

There once was a girl who used to close her eyes and tell herself stories every night as she slept.

Or as she tried to.

She would imagine dungeons and dragons and, or the light-footed sandals of Achilles whisking her high up into the air.

She would imagine breathing fire, bending water, having the clouds whisper into her ears.

Sometimes, when sleep did finally surrender itself to her wanting embrace, she would wake and want only to capture those dreams-before-dreams in words.

But by then, they were almost always forgotten.

But then she met a boy who was different to her.

Where she read books and studied words and marvelled at the multiplicity of meaning

(she overthought a lot)

He was practical and logical, applied this to his ambition and thought through a lense of numbers and strategies.

But such is often the beauty of encountering a mind so different to your own.

They often sat quietly, trying patiently to guess what the other was thinking.  

And then he told her own one night, before she had time for any confessions of her own,

That he too made up stories in his head every night as he waited for sleep.

“I usually give myself superpowers”, he said,

and she smiled.

THE PORCELAIN HEART.

Once there was a princess who was born with a heart outside of her body. It was a pale and slippery thing, and her parents lamented so, for how was she to be a great ruler in the kingdom with such a feeble heart? As if in demonstration, her mother went to pick up the heart, and cried out as the mucous tissue escaped her fingers and fell to the floor. There, the heart sat in a puddle of its own fleshy juices, surrounded by the eyes of the doctors and nurses, the king and queen. How was the princess to survive with a heart that could not withstand the light touch of fingertips, let alone the calling of a kingdom? 

A lot had been placed on the shoulders of this baby without a heart. She had not been the product of an easy birth. With no brothers and no sisters, the weight of her lineage rested at the foot of her cot. And here she was, with soft skin and supple lips, dainty features and a lick of golden cupid’s curls, perfect in every sense of the word bar the slimy, slug-like object on the ground at which her mother now pawed, attempting to retrieve it from the reddish mucus. The doctor bent to his knees, gently pushing the queen away, and retrieved the heart from the floor with the lithe fingers of a skilled surgeon. Well-versed in bedside manner, he told them in soothing tones that the girl would survive. It would not be an easy life that she would lead. She would have to carry her spineless and slippery heart with her, wherever she went, and keep it safe. It would need to be protected, held safe. He was certain that a cage of sorts, a portable device designed to safeguard the heart from greedy fingers, from foul smells and poisonous substances, from careless bystanders who might crush it by accident, or trample it by force. It would take some adjusting, but with time, he was certain the princess would learn to live with the heart outside of her body. 

The mother and father of the girl wept bitterly. They were grateful for the birth of their beautiful and blessed child, but they feared that it would be nothing but a short life that she would lead, with such an important organ beyond the safe confines of her skin. One mistake, one thoughtless manoeuvre, and the heart might be squished and pulverised into a pulp of nothingness. So, they prayed to the old gods, of whom we speak little and dare seldom to grant us wishes, for fear of powers so great they may only be whispered. They prayed that the girl’s heart would be strengthened and supported, so that she might be able to lead a normal life. The gods are cruel, tactless, and often take fancy in the torment of man. Prayers might come answered, and wishes granted, but never without a clause. Whichever god happened to be listening on this occasion delighted in acquiescing the pleas of the parents. One flick of the wrist of the powers of old, and the slippery red heart hardened and thickened, the soft, porous walls lengthened and fixed, and the heart transformed from something spongey and tongue-like, into a beautiful and shimmering heart of porcelain. The king and queen dried their tears and peered down at the baby and the chinaware heart nestled beneath her elbow, baffled by the modification and dubious as to whether this was actually an answering of their prayers. The doctor, ever versed in positive approaches, leapt to his feet and jumped to and fro in an excessively delighted manner. The gods had answered, a medical miracle had taken place, and though the heart had not been moved inside the boy, a heart of porcelain was far harder to break than a heart of blood. 

The girl grew, and wherever she went, either she or one of the king and queen’s many servants carried the porcelain heart. It was transported with delicacy and caution, wrapped in sables and furs and kept far from harm’s way. Not until the girl got older, was anyone other than her mother and father allowed to handle the porcelain heart. The lick of golden hair had lengthened into bouncy golden curls, her skin remained soft, her cheeks rosy and her eyes dark and bright. She was hard not to look at, and attracted the gazes of most of the young and available suitors of the kingdom (and some that were neither young nor available). Soon, there were more suitors lining up at the door than the kitchen staff had time to prepare tea and libations for. They clamoured and called, begging to enthrone the golden princess, to wrap a golden ring on her finger, or a ruby crown on her head, to spin her round the ballroom, or to trade her for the season’s pickings of produce and livestock. They were so enamoured with the princess’s round cheeks and light laugh, they failed to see the chips in the pretty porcelain heart, where cracks were already beginning to form.

It was not her fault that the heart had been chipped. Her gaze had one day fallen upon a young stable hand in the courtyard below. He had held her hand and shown her the tall draught horses, and the small stout pigs, and then sat down beside her in the straw and pressed his lips to her own. She had been so caught up in the newness of the feeling, the wetness of his lips and the heat of his breath on her face, that she had not seen him snake out his hands and run them over her porcelain heart, seated beside them in the straw. She had not felt the urgency of his clammy hands, squeezing the delicate ceramic, running grubby nails along its sides. She did not notice her heart contract and splinter, a small shard of sharp china falling off into the straw, burrowed deep amongst hooves and manure and sawdust.

Though this was the first occasion upon which the heart cracked, it was not the last. A deep fracture spread through the pale porcelain, when a visiting merchant’s son swapped some cinnamon for a quick fondle through her gauzy undergarments. A jagged edge broke loose when a young and dauntless prince swept her round the ballroom on light feet, kissed her goodnight with promises of endless returns, and failed to materialise the next morning. Further and further the heart splintered and cracked, until the heart was more splintered than it was whole, and the princess had to walk with it clutched gingerly to her chest, for fear of segments breaking away in her wake. Her curls flattened and her red cheeks paled, and the king and queen came to fear for the princess, who in turn feared leaving her room, and the safe confines by which the heart might not break any further. Anxious and distressed by the calamity of their only child, who now sequestered herself far up in the turrets, afraid of the greedy hands of the world, the king and queen prayed again to the old gods, begging them to repair her porcelain heart. But the old gods turned away and ignored the pleas of the helpless couple, for they had already had their wish granted, and no deity is so generous as to accede to two wishes of mortals (they mustn’t be spoiled, after all). 

All around the kingdom, word was sent of the princess’s breaking heart, and a huge prize was prepared for anyone who might be able to repair the ailing organ. Many came, and some tried (the princess was by now very particular about whom she allowed to touch her fragile porcelain heart), but none succeeded, and the heart cracked and splintered further, and the princess became ever increasingly fragile and weak. Curtains were drawn and doors were closed, and the castle became a dark and gloomy residence, of timid movements and careful steps, all in fear that even the slightest of tremors might cause the porcelain heart to crumble.

As does so often in the crucial moment of stories, a tall dark stranger arrived at the doors of the castle. Wrapped up in cloaks and gloves and a long woolly scarf, he spoke in hushed whispers of his trade, and requested a sitting with the princess, as to ascertain the damage to her porcelain heart. The king and queen regarded him with worried glances, but dreaded even more the fast-approaching day that the porcelain heart collapsed, and most probably took their daughter with it into the dust. The stranger was brought up to see the princess, who was by now listless and gaunt, her golden curls lifeless and her eyes drooping and dull. The stranger sank deep into a bow before the girl, and asked gently to see the porcelain heart. He was a pottery maker, he explained, with a penchant for fixing the broken dishes and vases of the world. To lifeless and tired to think of a reason to deny him the request, the princess pulled out a bundle of tattered rags, within which lay the cracked and dying heart. Held together only by thin conduits of porcelain, the heart looked wretched, as if a strong breath might blow it to pieces. With slender fingers, reminiscent of the genteel surgeon who had once saved the slippery red heart from its imminent demise upon the birth of the baby girl, the stranger reached out and stroked the frail sides of the heart. From the depths of his coat, he pulled out a curious looking gel – a home remedy, taught to him by his mother, who was taught by her grandparents, and so forth - and with a swift precursory glance at the princess for her express permission, he began to glue the shards back together. 

Now the heart was never truly fixed. It is difficult, if not impossible, to fix things that have been broken. But, with time, and care, a cautious hand and a precise eye, the shards gradually returned into the walls of the heart where they had once stood. The princess fell in love with the man (for how could she have not, having been privy to his soft words and velveteen manner, in a world otherwise full of vying, greedy individuals). The fragment of heart that had once been lost in the stables, amongst the straw, was even found years and years after it first broke loose from the porcelain heart. Together in the castle, the princess and the pottery maker lived, with him patiently on hand to glue parts of her heart back together as they weathered and aged.

Embracing Contradictions with Nayrouz Qarmout.

Nayrouz Qarmout was born in a Palestinian refugee camp in Damascus in 1984 and later ‘returned’ to Gaza in 1994 as part of the Oslo Peace Accord, where she continues to live and write. An author, journalist, and female rights activist, she has worked in the Ministry of Women’s Affairs and is now running for a position in parliament (she says ‘it is not easy for a free woman to enter election in an occupied country’), and works tirelessly in raising awareness surrounding the position of women in society. Her anthology of 14 short stories, The Sea Cloak, won several awards at the Edinburgh Book Festival in 2019, which Nayrouz attended despite two visa rejections and countless hurdles. This was the first time she had been able to leave Gaza since arriving in 1994. The collection provides a keyhole into life as a woman in the ‘world’s largest prison’, and follows very human experiences of living in one of the least understood cities in the middle east. Her aim is to humanise Palestinians, so they are no longer seen as just victims but as people.

Pairing everyday life with the trauma of living in a war zone, Qarmout’s short stories and lyrical prose in The Sea Cloak illuminate the lives of Palestinians in a poetic yet impartial narrative. In Breastfeeding, 13yr old Sara is diligently studying in the hope of leaving her family’s mud-walled hut for university, but has her hopes dashed when she is forced to marry her cousin. In White Lilies, a drone operator looks idly on after pressing a button detonating a bomb near a school. In The Long Braid, a young schoolgirl argues brazenly with a teacher who denounces all emancipated women as ‘sluts’. The themes that these three stories touch upon including feminism, war, love, resilience, and of being human are embodied by Nayrouz, giving strength, clarity and realism to her work. 

What is something about your background that is important for people to know to understand your writing?

I’d spent my life displaced between different places. I was always searching for an identity, looking to belong to whatever group. What did “belonging” mean? Why did we feel so constantly unstable? How did we define ourselves in relation to groups around us when we didn’t have the opportunity to live in close proximity for as long as we did?

I read that you have a degree in economics. That’s quite a jump to writing - how did you start writing?

It’s actually a little more complicated than that. I originally went into the science stream in high school, not the literary one, and when that was done, I did pharmaceuticals for three and a half years. I chose to leave that and studied economics for a bunch of reasons, the first of which was that I wanted to study outside of universities in Gaza but had no ID or passport for a long time. The other thing was that, for reasons unknown to me, the sciences in our country, like medicine, engineering, and pharmaceuticals, are full of deeply religious and even puritanical people. I’m more socially progressive, and other colleges were easier on that. The third reason was that I wanted to study things that were simply not available to us. As for the switch to writing, perhaps social and political circumstances set that off inside me. It started with political writing and wound up in stories. But I’ve always expressed myself in writing, illustrating things in Arabic, taking in the world as any creative person would but previously not actually putting pen to paper. I think it’s a talent more than anything.

Growing up in Syrian refugee camp Al-Yarmouk in Damascus - could you tell me a little about this?

I was a very imaginative child. I remember those times fondly, even though they were really difficult on a family. I grew up in a politically conscientious, private family. This made us different to a lot of people living in the camp. My mother was born in Damascus and my grandma lived in Rif-Dimashq, in the country. It was a long but beautiful road when I came home from a school for Palestinian refugees to visit my grandmas with the rest of the family on weekends.

Do you have literary influences & who are they?

I try not to be too affected by anyone. My imagination runs off of my own senses and the contradictions I see in daily life. But I loved the poetry of Mahmoud Darwish and the stories of Ghassan Kanafani. When I wrote my first story, I wasn't reading literature, instead being glued to politics. The articles I’d write were entirely political. After I wrote my first story, “The Sea Cloak,” I began to read more literature, more stories and novels.

Where do you get the inspiration for the short stories? Are they your own (personal) stories, ones you have heard, historical, or fictional?

Stories are like a tune you hear. They come from everything: your experiences, your imagination, your history. Some stories are entirely fictive but which readers think are real. Even if I hear a story from history or recycle one of my own experiences, I don’t keep them intact. I work in some imagination and even characterisation, even into the character readers mistake for an author surrogate.

What drives you to write about the challenging issues that you write about, and do you ever have any concerns, for example that people might take what your words in the wrong way?

When I write, I do so confidently, because whatever value I’m reflecting in my story at that moment will be the result of interrogating all contradictory viewpoints that people hold and complexities at the heart of an issue, including context. Writing that doesn’t challenge an issue at the heart of life is useless. A trivial detail dismissed by most could hold depth that recontextualises social behaviour. Writing has two missions: one, which is artistic, is a form of creative illustration. The other is ethical, concerned with what it means to be a human being. To build a strong society, we need creative revolution. We must ignore voices that seek to dishearten and be fully courageous in presenting our opinions. I hope to see my community in a light that befits its sacrifices.

You said in an interview that you did in 2018 that you were sick of the stereotypes that media outlets propagate about Gaza. Can you elaborate on that? Do you use your writing to try and counter those narratives?

Of course I’d like to combat the stereotyped image of Gaza, which perpetuates a particular view of the place and marginalises others, building a fantasy version of the city and its residents, as if they’d ever had the opportunity to try a different life. I have tried through my stories to fight this image. I’ve spent a not inconsiderable amount of time writing stories that attempt to objectively capture reality, the objective reality of a situation and portrayal of people, removed from my own interpretation of them.

Do you find that you have a Palestinian audience for your work? Is there a wider audience and support for literature and culture?

I have a sizable audience that enjoys my work. They’re looking for something new, and I think there’s a contradiction where I’ve tried taking both external forces and Palestinian society to task that I’ve striven for that people have enjoyed. After the long siege of Gaza, there has been a yearning for art, literature, and culture in changing their lives for the better. People are tired of isolation and soul and hope-withering dogmatism.

Tell me about the translation of your work – did/do you have any concerns in handing over your text to someone else (are they an outsider or do you know the translator)?

On the contrary: at the beginning, I had no issue sending my work to anyone to translate, even if I hadn’t the faintest idea who the translator was. But after long experience, I’ve become wary of a translator’s ability to comprehend a text. Translation necessitates understanding the culture being translated from, especially for literary or philosophical text. It requires an artistic eye for interpretation. More than that, it requires respecting the text, ensuring it does not deviate from its ideas nor uses its platform to promote another idea that removed from to the writer's mind or direction. A single world could completely change meaning. Arabic is eloquent, and a language heavy with connotation. Maintaining that is difficult. Other languages are peculiar in their own ways, and translating them requires a lot of work and imaginative reading.

One translator I worked with on my first story was absolutely astounding. We’d discuss a single sentence for its allusions and connotations so that she could get to the heart of the matter, with me explaining my exact intended meaning, allowing her to write the sentence exactly as it was intended.

I read that you had quite a journey and several hurdles getting to the Edinburgh book festival in 2018. Could you explain why it is so difficult to enter/exit Gaza, and has it changed at all in the few years since?

After the 2000 Al-Aqsa Intifada on Palestinian lands and the destruction of the Yasser Arafat International Airport in Rafah built after the Oslo Accords, it became very difficult to cross at the Rafah Border Crossing into Egypt, as the occupation was squatted at the bridge. After the 2005 deal and the Israeli withdrawal from Gaza—or, more accurately, its reorganisation just outside the Strip—the Palestinians directly controlled the crossing. But after Hamas won the 2006 Palestinian legislative election and its refusal to recognise the Quartet on the Middle East, we lost Palestinian control of the crossing, especially after internal fighting and the Palestinian Authority’s collapse in the Gaza Strip. We need difficult coordination with the Egyptian side to agree to the passage of travellers, and most of the time the crossing is closed and when it opens it suffers from overcrowding. The crossing is for those with priority, whether those with residency abroad, or people who are sick, or students.

Yes, my journey was very difficult and haphazard. The road was long and the barriers in the desert numerous. It was very hot. I ought to again point out that I did not possess a Palestinian ID or passport to travel until 2009. Prior to that, as a Palestinian refugee, I was not given any official identification after my return to Gaza in 1994. My trip to Edinburgh was the first time I had travelled from Gaza to the rest of the world.

What is it like at the moment being a woman in Gaza?

A woman who does not adhere to traditional ideas but can command respect from different social sects…well, this can be a heavy burden to bear, and could take much from you. Being able to affirm your existence without compromising your independence or something fundamental to you but nonetheless having to compromise…it’s a sacrifice made for the sake of all women in our society.

You said you’re running for a position in parliament. This is really impressive. Do you have any opinions on change for your country?

Well, the simple act of running for office is in itself an attempt at renewal and imposing a different structure that embraces intellectual and political diversity and plurality, as well as the possibility of working towards a permanent solution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict from various directions and structures of Palestinian society, which is still amorphous and does not have a clear vision for a possible solution after the occupation thwarted any political solution, including that of two-states, on the occupied territories of 1967. I hope to contribute even a small part to helping my people survive and develop under the circumstances and pressures they are subjected to.

WELL CHILD.

There is a girl at the bottom of the well. 

Of that he is sure.

He hears her whimpers late at night. 

At first, he thinks it must be a kitten, for all the soft and breathless mewls. 

But one day he lets his curiosity get the better of him.

On tip toes he stands at the side of the well.

Even so, he is barely tall enough to peer over the edge.

He teeters,

Grubby fingernails clinging on to the webs of lichen and moss,

Covering the century old structure. 

A string hangs in the centre of the well.

One he hasn’t noticed before.

Or perhaps it is more of a rope?

The end of the rope is knotted and tied

Such that it reminds him of a noose. 

Not that he’s ever seen a noose, mind.

But after the order for whole pastures of fat cows and fluffy lambs to be burned,

One of the Eastern farmers strung himself up to the barn rafters

And dangled above the milking machines.

The boys at school traced one in the playground in powdery chalk

that refused to wash away for weeks after.

The wooden beams supporting the rope aren’t strong enough to hang a body from anyway.

They look brittle and rotten and riddled with bugs.

And who could blame them?

No one has cared for this house since his Great Aunt Matilda

Who patched up the holes and tended to the gardens

Who thatched the roof and mended the awnings

Who whispered to plants and spread love into paint.

His own mother sighs as the house crumbles, 

And floats off to bed. 

He hears her most at night, through the cracked glass

Of his windows which face the orchard

And all its wizened trees

Which have born no apple in the days he can remember. 

She is calling him.

Or is she singing?

He down the pillow over his ears 

And tries to block out her lonely song.

Now the boy grows braver too,

As boys of his age tend to do. 

Up to the rim of the well he clambers

Peering precociously over the edge.

For a brief moment he wonders who would come to rescue him

If he were to fall in.

It certainly wouldn’t be his mother. 

Nonetheless, the brave boy hoists himself up

Bearing the weight on the flats of his hands

And squints down the tunnel.

He thinks he can see a pale face

Lit up by a portion of the moon.

But the boy looks back and sees that it is still daylight behind him

The sun peaks at its highest over the bowed apple trees

And he knows he shall soon be expected for the afternoon wash.

So he turns on his heels

Making off for the washing house,

But he doesn’t dare forget the pale moon-touched face. 

Now you’d think that the boy might forget the girl at the bottom of the well.

Boys do after all have a lot to think about

From slugs and snails to newts to balls to spinners to diablos

From cuts and scrapes to scratches to very unfortunate broken arms

From bedtimes and wake-ups to sisters and cousins and babies

From lessons and tutors to lonely walk homes and slightly too small shoes

From anger and embarrassment to getting pink-cheeked when sat beside the girl with plaits.

But this boy remembers

And waits for the dead of night

When he knows that the moon will actually be up to guide his way

And light up whoever lingers at the bottom of the well.

And so he sneaks out

On timid feet

In undersized shoes.

But why he is sneaking, even he doesn’t know.

He could burn the house down and his mother would still stay as she is

Head buried in the pillow 

Vegetating in the sheets.

He slips out into the dead of night.

Outside it is quiet

As it tends to be when you inhabit a space in the country so deep

That the boy could walk for all the hours of the darkness

And still not come across another house.

His footsteps are muffled in the damp and dewy grass

The silence is in fact stifling.

He reaches the well, and hoists up his limber body

And peers back down into the unforgiving darkness.

He wonders if he should have brought a snack.

Perhaps she likes jam sandwiches?

But it is too late to dally and consider a strawberry sweet peace offering.

He swipes at the frayed rope, and catches it between clammy hands.

One deft tug, and it tells him that it will carry his weight

Down to the well floor.

The boy and the girl do not run into one another’s arms

For why would they, they are not acquainted.

Instead, the boy having landed on his hands in knees

In an inch of putrid well water,

The girl sits at a safe distance and watches him warily.

He can see that there is little left of her

Soft flesh stripped away, leaving milky white bones.

Her hair remains.

It even seems to have grown down here

In this dark and desperate dungeon,

And hangs in clumps and tangles, embroiled with lichen and weeds.

Now for her face.

He cannot tell if she is smiling or grimacing

For undressed from flesh and skin and organs,

All that remains is a skull, tilted to one side

And gazing at him with what he supposes is a perplexed expression

(but this is hard to tell without cheeks and lips

and in place two dark vortexes where blue eyes once sat).

He supposes she wouldn’t have enjoyed a strawberry sandwich after all

As she seems to be missing all the necessary organs.

Nonetheless, he squats in the murky waters at the bottom of the well

And extends a hand.

An act of peace and welcome.

She has little to offer in the way of hospitality herself

With no seat nor bed nor food at the bottom of the well

And only the company of newts and slugs and the odd rat who has gladly avoided drowning

But yet she extends her hand to match the boy

Though the joints creak and groan and weeds fall away from her ulna.

So they sit, the two children at the bottom of the well

One bright and buoyant boy

Although his rosy cheeks are subdued by the watery greens and greys

And one skeleton girl.

A leader of a lonely life,

With only the accompaniment of his mother’s soft whimpers in the dead of night,

The boy is somewhat lacking in the friendship department.

He hasn’t been to school in months now anyway,

But his classmates conceded him were a series of nicknames and snickers. 

So, the boy is obliging and open hearted. 

He meets the skeletal fingers that extend out to greet him,

And makes as not to look at the rancid water that drips from her bones. 

Now the girl cannot speak.

She lacks the flesh and the blood and vitality to speak.

In fact, her voice box decayed decades ago.

But somehow, through her touch, she tells her story.

Is that so difficult to imagine? 

More so than a skeletal girl living at the bottom of the well?

She spreads out her digits, scraping against his soft palms,

And tells him her tale.

Now I must prepare you, for it is a sad account

For whoever heard of a girl who lived at the bottom of a well

Who lived a happy story, 

A happy life?

She was once so very beautiful,

A thick dark mane that once gleamed free of the lichen and newts that now lived within,

Soft white skin and rosy cheeks.

She looked like her mother, who was known around the parts 

Largely for her wayward spirit.

She prayed to the old gods, and taught her daughter

Never to mix wolfsbane and nettle

And that a fox seen at sunset cautions of a broken heart.

They kept to themselves, largely at the edge of the moors,

For the townsfolk didn’t understand her potions and prayers,

And how she whispered to the ghosts of the undead, 

Who at night roamed over the marshes.

Yet sometimes in the dead of night,

The townswoman crept over to the little cottage,

And asked for a milk thistle paste to cleanse the body,

Or a tincture of basil and borage to heal the heart.

The wild woman of the moors never turned them away,

Despite the way they turned their faces from her in public

And the spits and sneers with which their husbands greeted her.

She greeted these women stragglers with few words,

Ushering her own children into the corner of the dimly lit cabin, 

And pressing the desired tonic into wanting hands.

She never accepted any of the coins they tried to return.

And though she minded her own ways, 

And though she gained a quiet respect from the village women,

Soothing their aching heads and ailing stomachs and cleansing their corporeal corruption,

The men still hounded her children.

At first, with glances.

This quickly followed by catcalls.

Once, they chased home her eldest,

The lithe girl with the mane of black curls.

She was lucky, on this occasion.

On the second, her mother’s rose quartz lacked the luck to bring her safely home.

They traversed her with callused hands

Still dirty from the fields.

She ended up red and black and blue

But these marks marring her soft white skin were hard to see

For there was hardly any light at the bottom of the well.

She wonders what happened to her mother.

Of course, she is by now long dead.

But whether she stayed, tied to the log cabin with the kindling fire

And the rows of herbs and roots and seeds.

She misses the sweet, earthy smell of those four wooden walls.

Or whether the loss of her eldest daughter proved too much to bear.

Her mother would have known,

Surely.

A child of the marshes, she knew never to stray too close to the bogs

Or to dare cross the swamps past bedtime. 

Did she look for her?

Did she walk into the village,

Bare foot as she went, with her raven hair and sun weathered skin

Did she scream and cry and beg the townsfolk to bring her back her baby?

Did she ever peer down into the dark and cavernous well

And see the broken white body that lay below?

All this the well girl tells him 

And all the while the boy listens.

He offers to take her

Or what is left of her,

And bury it above ground

But she refuses.

For what would she be now

A dead girl amongst the living?

She presses something into his palms.

A silver bracelet encrusted with muddied charms

A pretty thing that doesn’t belong in the shadows. 

She bids him farewell, and hoists him up

So he may clamber up the slippery wet walls

And return to the land of the living.

Gradually,

The boy forgets.

He forgets the girl that lives at the bottom of the well

And perhaps in his forgetting,

She ceases to exist.

Nonetheless, he grows up

And marries a pretty girl of his own

THE RUIN OF A CIRCUS.

I used to love going to the circus when I was younger. Not so pro using animals nowadays but this also isn't anti-circus propaganda. I think I've just watched too much American Horror Story... I would ultimately love to do a piece for every act & animal but kept to a select four for now!

1. tigers

The tigers are tired. They lope around the arena, with sore toes and a resilient bout of mange thinning their furling tails. The circus used to employ a vet, you see, but that part of the budget was first to go. They’re sturdy animals, the director insisted. In reality, they were hardly sturdy, having been flown in from all over the world. An Ostrich in York, shivering against the Autumn breeze. Three elephants in Hertfordshire, braced together against the first snowfall. The streak of tigers , who managed to catch a particularly nasty bout of cat flu from some Somerset moggies, four of which consequently now adorn the Enchantress’ cabin, as a ragged bunch of pelts. Even if the animals can’t take the climate, the director stokes them on, jabbing his fists and flogging any mammal who dare refuse his command. (Three quarters of the once stocked menagerie have now either been immortalised in the form of taxidermy, or lie below ground). The Strongman is by far a cheaper method of dealing with the sickly, and those who don't do as they are told . Not just physically robust, he’s also the only one not to flinch when they drag out the diseased and ailing and give them a swift bullet through the head. No, but the tigers are tired. They want to lie down, to stretch, and feel the unforgiving sun beating down on their stripes. They know the taste of the whip, if they do falter, pause, even refuse to hurl their weight through one of the flaming hoops. An almost balanced choice of pain, between lurching into the hot flames and the bite of the whip. Not that they weigh much, in this day and age. The tiger who came to tea should be fed on succulent meats; fat steaks and fresh blood. A can of putrid sardines has become the likely dinner. A sorry streak of tigers, absent is the dynamism which once propelled them through the flames. Now, they hesitate and waver. They choose between the lash of the whip, and the lick of the flames, and gamble as to the lesser pain.

(A group of tigers is indeed called a streak of tigers. Gaggle of geese. Streak of tigers. Who knew.)

2. circus master

All eyes on the circus master. He takes centre stage, spotlights amplifying his position. He needs the amplification, really. He’s a small man. Barely reaches five-foot-five, even in the scuffed tap shoes, which bless him with that very necessary extra half inch. Boy does he need it. He used to tower over his performers; maybe not in height, but certainly in stature. Holding that gleaming club in one hand, he had the tigers and the trapeze artists eating out of his palms – quite literally, in the case of the latter. Less so now. Murmurs of dissent run amongst the performers, meows of disapproval from the big-cats. Someone must be responsible for the leaking caravans, for the threadbare costumes, empty seats. Someone must be held responsible for the deserted ticket booths, the empty wage envelopes. They’re starting to starve, the performers. They jostle and leer at the circus master – he still has the largest caravan on site, after all. Needs a lick of paint and new upholstery, but otherwise it’s the most in shape of all the make-do scrap in which the others find shelter. They’re starving, you see. They make joke about eating up the little circus master, a cannibalistic outlet of the rage they feel in their hungry bellies. Well, jokes – they say – but someone has already anonymously carved up one of the emus, roasted it on a spit and left the plumage round the back.

3. animal keeper/costumier

But oh, now, for the animal keeper. Or the costume maker? Oh but of course, the funding to have two such roles ran out almost a decade prior, so the two very different jobs have now been amalgamated into one. A stout little man, he himself flounces around in an old purple brocade that hasn’t been washed since the seventies. He hardly has time to feed the penguins, and make sure the final, left over elephant has something more substantial to eat than hedge trimmings. He’s told his second in command – his chef de partie– of the animal world time and time again that no, the elephant most certainly isn’t going to be eating roasted road kill. In any case, the last sorry carcass he picked up looked awfully like a rat, and aren’t elephants terrified of mice? The last thing he needs is for the sorry looking great hunk of a beast to be throwing any temper tantrums. The circus once had a flurry of pretty pretty girls, who flung themselves up on to the back of the great, lumbering elephant. They sold tickets, with their tight curls and cherry-red lacquered lips. And their costumes, oh to think of the costumeshe once made. Tutus studded with tiny jewels, and tight corsets made of the finest goose down. What he would do to be back amongst his old fabrics, tracing dainty fingers through velvets and silks. His fingers are calloused now. A residual layer of dirt seems to stick below his nails, no matter how hard he scrubs. There’s no money for costumes, and no performers to dress. It’s a good thing he and the elephant get on so well, as he spends far more time caring for the great brute than designing clothes for non-existent acrobats.

4. tarot reader

A smattering of hairballs, as she has a sorry tendency to pull out her own during states of crystal-ball-reading induced psychosis, tired and stained corsets strewn across the floor. Remnants of meals shared with the ill-tempered street cat are growing mould on most available countertops. She’s lived in the same caravan for the past 17 years. It’s not a case of attachment; circus wages hardly afford bespoke wheels and embroidery. If she had it her way, she’d have her customers enter into one of those fancy hand painted affairs, with her name in loping cursive on treated wood. Instead, she must entertain them on the front ‘porch’ (as much as one can be said to have a porch without house). One of the younger construction boys – not much to look at, even given her tendency to let her eyes wander onto the strapping young lads who hoist and heave with the tent poles, and master even the wildest of horses – had a tarpaulin sheet pinned down from the caravan, covering the two seats and table from at least the worst of the elements. It isn’t however wholly waterproof, the odd drip just adds to the ominous atmosphere she tries to create when reading of tall dark strangers and twists in the road ahead. Admittedly, she shouldn’t have let her stained and wrinkled fingers grope their way under the table upon which the crystal rests (the boys almost didn’t notice, too entranced with the orb, and the promises of pretty wives and a poker’s fortune). She might have gained herself a little reputation, here and there. She pretends she can’t hear their catcalls when she goes to dinner. Slinks into the communal tent. Grabs her soup and stale crust, and hunches over one of the empty benches in the corner. She only had her tarots read once; for all a lifetime of pawing out cards and glossing over the future, she doesn’t believe much in knowing what lies ahead before you should. Or, having been told her days would be filled with disappointment, she knows that the cards can cut a little too close to home. 

FLOTSAM & JETSAM

I think, that as humans first waded out to sea to explore what lay ahead, on whatever little rafts they had constructed, made up of hollow logs and tightly wound grasses, the world probably seemed enormous. The further they sailed (or floated, for that matter), the more they discovered of the wide and endless seas, and incomprehensibly far-stretched lands, the bigger the world seemed. Yet, paradoxically, the further man travelled upon the high seas, discovering just how huge the world was, the smaller the world actually became, as each beach and land and sea and continent was labelled down in a map. Finally, when all lands and seas had been successfully captured down on paper, the world must not have seemed quite so big anymore. The map, acting as a form of limit, and a restraint, removes the possibility of undiscovered lands, filled with pixies or cyclops or mermen, and instead cemented the firm concept of ‘here’ and ‘there’.  

‘Here’ is easier to comprehend, soft sands beneath my toes, and warm sunshine on my face. Except it really is neither of those things, as instead deep in the throes of the turbulent and untrustworthy Scottish weather, where you’re getting weather-beaten and whipped by saltwater skies, and god forbid you’ve tried to take off your shoes in the bitter cold conditions. Shell Bay, on the East Coast of Scotland. 

(I’ve decided to take us outside for my place as we have already spent an awful lot of time inside, these past 6 months). 

It’s a simple beach, really. But then again, aren’t all beaches simple, composed of sea and sky and sand. What little else is there, in between? 

Well, you’d be surprised. 

Quaint seaside stores along the way sell canvas after canvas of local depictions of this particular beach. This seascape. And perhaps, despite having earlier thought that really, how could one beach differ that much to the next, you pause long enough to tilt your head at one of the pictures, and can recognise the headland dipping in at just the right angle, and the curve of the bay, and just the right content of moss and slippery sea weeds covering the rocks. And despite thousands of beaches, and thousands of these accompanying seaside stores filled with variable takes on the seascapes, you can still tell one seascape from the next. True, you’ll probably need to have visited the beach in question, but say you’re dining at the house of a friend, and notice a stormy sea hanging over the mantelpiece, you’ll instantly be able to point and say (this, assuming you have been there);

“well, isn’t that Bamburgh Beach” or

“Durdle Door at sunset?” or even

“that’s Slapton Sands, right?”

(Whoever names beaches does certainly love a bit of alliteration).

And you’ll be filled with a warming, contented glow, knowing that you managed to recognise the place from an assortment of strokes on a canvas, hanging in the home of a friend, and that you too have seen that section of sky, and that portion of sea, and marched your awfully wet walking boots through that same stretch of sand. And maybe, through sinking your heels into the sand, and leaving a trail of footprints, and staring up at the sky or out to sea, you’ve left a little part of yourself on that beach. Maybe that to you brings a form of solace, knowing that one day, you’ll be long gone, but a little part of you will remain on that beach, taking in a big gulp of salty air, and staring out to sea. 

Of course, not every beach will be the same for every person. Shell Bay, as I mentioned earlier, will for me always be a beach misnamed. Shell Bay, when in fact it was always littered with shoes. Never pairs, always only one single and lonely washed up shoe. One big grey trainer, threadbare and missing a sole. One olive green flipflop, hardly visible amongst the seaweeds. One tiny bright pink shoe – the sort where you could house a little plastic dolly in the heel, complete with an entire outfit in shades of neon. The poor plastic dolly probably somewhere out there, bobbing in the waves, or sunk amongst the fishes. And looking out at these many sole shoes, littered in the sand amongst the torn plastic bags and smoothed pebbles, it seems almost conceivable that these shoes filtered in from a different place, one beyond the horizon, and in the distance lay a whole different dimension, a shore filled with puzzled people missing shoes.  

I used to find this just so terribly funny. 

“Why don’t they name it Shoe Bay, instead of Shell Bay”.  

We walked at this beach an awful lot, and every time I managed to slip in this sentence. 

 And every time, no one laughed. 

 And whilst I was so absorbed in pointing out these forlorn shoes, and being swatted whenever I tried to go and actually pick one up because God child just think of the germs (when I thought saltwater was so terribly cleansing), the seascape around me changed. That is the beauty of choosing a place outdoors, beyond the safe confines of four walls and a predictable weather pattern. For some, standing on the same beach, taking in the same cove funnelling into a stack a spit a cave an arch headland stump lagoon shore cliff salt marsh bay, covered in the same sand meeting the sea blending into sky waves froth quell tide pebbles driftwood seaweed shell, will be a bucolic place, sheltered in their memory. Coming down to a pathetic fallacy of sorts, the sky will be rose-tinted, the sand soft, and the waves welcoming. This, on canvas, would be sky of lilac hues and warm tints, perhaps with a child playing in the sand, or a dog testing the waters in the distance. 

By contrast, one could have quite the same spot, on the same beach, at the same time of year, with a forbidding sea painted in ominous shades of cerulean blue, of teal and cobalt and azure, against angry skies of oppressive slate grey, thunder and smoke, and an empty beach void of life.

Same beach, same location, but different place. In painting these landscapes, an artist might capture their personal relationship with the place. In traipsing down these beachside promenades, ice cream in hand, looking for just the right seaside painting, or little driftwood horse, buyers can take home a sliver of the place, to carry with them and eventually hang in their own homes. Pictures, paintings, trinkets and souvenirs, becoming snippet of a place, or a memory. A tiny Sicilian horse and cart beneath a seascape painting of your favourite beach, an embellished Japanese Omamori hanging beside a fan of wrinkled concert tickets, a broken snow globe you were given as a child, and some Venetian glass inherited from your mother. A decorated home becomes a quilt of sorts, fragments of other memory safe havens woven together into one large tapestry of safety and retreat. 

SEASIDE.

It’s what you British like to call summer-time, and you’ve dragged me to the sea. You wouldn’t believe it. The canopy of clouds is too thick for any sun to pierce its way through. Were we still in LA, on a beach day back with my family, the beach would be littered with scantily clad tourists and sunbathers. Here, we are alone. Almost alone, if you discount the faint silhouette of a man and dog tossing a ball to and fro. I don’t mind it. In fact I think I prefer it. I can hear the wind and the waves and a few stray gulls and your laugh piercing these sounds of the sea as you toss something my way.

I feel saltwater seeping into my old worn welly, but I don’t mind that either. I scrunch up my toes and it seeps slightly further into my socks, a slightly cold and prickling sensation. Your mum lent me these. Pulled the well-worn boots out of a cupboard with a delighted smile and told me I was going to love the British seaside. It took a little to win her over. I paid due care in saying please and thank you, and complimenting her cooking, but what really won her over was when I got down on my hands and knees whilst she was weeding, and asked questions about the clematis and rhododendrons. You were in the shower. I could see her face light up, the formal mask she likes to hold up around me soften. I know she’s apprehensive. They blame me a little for your jet-setting lifestyle. You always spend a lifetime in the shower, enough time for her to point out the late-Spring bloomers, and rant about the peat-laden soil in the area. After that she was warmer, brushing my shoulders as she walked past, or filling up my mug of hot coffee without asking. She pulled those wellies out of the cupboard with gusto, assuring me that despite the temperature and the dubious looking skies, we would have the best time. Alongside the wellies, I’ve been clad in a thick tweed waterproof, just the sort I imagined your family to have lying around. I almost look ready enough to go out and shoot something. 

Something slaps me on the chest, and I look up. Your light peals of laughter have increased to cackles. Following the unidentified object, I find myself peering at a lilac-hued pile of what appears to be slime. Upon closer examination, I realise that it is in fact a tentacle-less jellyfish. I think you see the annoyance flash across my face, as your laughter slows and you gesture to the tide line.

“They don’t sting. These ones are harmless”.

I roll my eyes, but take a step closer to the streamlined section of beach where the water meets the sand. Hundreds of these lilac-blue blobs line the tideline.

“These guys must’ve been unlucky. Happens when the tides change, or it’s too cold”. 

I didn’t know you were a jellyfish expert. I guess that sort of thing happens, when you have tweed jackets in your cupboard. I pick up a loose piece of driftwood and prod one delicately. This triggers fresh amusement on your face. 

“They won’t bite. Or sting. Such a big group of them, it’s called a bloom”.

A bloom of jellyfish. How poetic.

You take a step closer, and I narrow my eyes. I don’t want to be hit by anymore harmless-or-not-so-harmless dead jellyfish. But, you pause, smile, then press your lips against mine. I can taste the salt in your kiss. You pull away, looking almost bashful, and entwine an arm around mine. 

“Come on”.

We meander back to where the car is parked, bracing against the strong winds and the gulls, and the lone man and his dog. You’ve promised your mum you won’t let me leave without tasting the finest ice cream the British seaside has to offer.