Congratulations to Frances Browner
Words Ireland Mentoring Programme 2019
Again, congratulations to Frances.
Frances has been chosen from 300 candidates to receive one of 21 mentoring places.
Successful candidates will receive one-to-one mentoring with professional mentors|writers.
We are delighted that Frances will be furthering her professional writing career.
And very happy to have her associated with GCS.
If you have any interest at all in writing, why not join Frances each Wednesday evening ??
Putting your thoughts and feelings on paper can be very helpful and restorative.
Try it and see !!
Famine Walk
On Carrownisky strand the sun is rising.
Rosarie and her roosters flock to greet me.
With a flap of feather and cock-a-doodle-doo
their welcome not for me, but hope for food.
Overnight, Michael’s cow has calved.
‘A young bull,’ he announces with pride
taking dairy nuts to the heifer, for a treat
‘To soothe her,’ he says, to make his peace.
In 1849, the villagers of Louisburgh trudged
twelve miles to Delphi Lodge. Were turned
away to starve on the road back. Their blood
seeping the dark waters of Doolough.
At the town twinning with Louisbourg, Nova Scotia
we dine on ham hock terrine, creamed potatoes
slow-roasted beef in wine sauce. Four hundred
corpses linger, mouths green from chewing grass.
[widecontent background_color=”#f5f5f5″ parallax=”no” background_position=”50% 50%” background_repeat=”no-repeat” padding_top=”10px” padding_bottom=”10px” font_color=”#222222″ font_size=”18px” centered=”no”]
Frances Browner, creative writing/history tutor, had short fiction and memoirs published and broadcast on Irish radio before she was bitten by the poetry bug four years ago. Since then, her poems have appeared in print and online journals. A Micro-Chap of fifteen poems, SELFIES, was released by Ghost City Press, NY, this summer. Frances facilitates the Scriobh Aris writing workshop in GCSG every week and the monthly Open Mic in Mrs. Robinson’s on the last Wednesday of the month.
[/widecontent]
[divider style=”shadow” margin_top=”30px” margin_bottom=”30px”]
Memory of my Father after Kavanagh
Every aged man I see,
Reminds me of my father
Easter lily pinned, lying at peace
Last Spring, no words to proffer.
That man I saw on Main Street
Stagger and fall was he
Marbled eyes daring to meet
Vacant, lost, for all to see.
And I remember the writer,
A scholar and sometimes poet
In Nora’s bar in summer,
His light shone there for a moment.
Every elderly man I see
In July’s long pleasant days,
A kindly spirit whispers to me,
“A chara, with love, your father”
Deirdre McKernan (Crosby)
June 2019
[widecontent background_color=”#f5f5f5″ parallax=”no” background_position=”50% 50%” background_repeat=”no-repeat” padding_top=”10px” padding_bottom=”10px” font_color=”#222222″ font_size=”18px” centered=”no”]
Poem recognises Kavanaghs poetic style and accounts of everyday observations family and country life
McKernan family roots – Monaghan.
Dad: Born in Gorbels, Glasgow, raised in Donegal, educated in Galway, he never forgot his Monaghan family who we visited as a family in the 60s. Access through a field of potatoes!!
He was also a fluent speaker of Irish.
60s – our family witnessed a life changing event when his wife of only 13 years suddenly left home never to return.
His life went into freefall drinking too much over many years – met and sipped a few with Kavanagh in An Beal Bocht (pub just off the canal in Dublin)
Often times a period of immense pain for the entire family.
In his final years with dementia and life threatening illnesses, his family supported him unconditionally to a dignified and peaceful ending.
Deirdre McKernan Crosby
[/widecontent]
[divider style=”shadow” margin_top=”30px” margin_bottom=”30px”]