Girl on the Playground

by Margarita Bonifaz

I am by the side fence

holding my long dark braids

where else?

trying to keep myself safe

my job back then,

still is

in the center

of the field

there   you   are

you have gone wild with rage

Your red hair is flying

your words full of literary curses

Your genius went unrecognized

except I always saw it

So did Mrs. Sharkey

she was just so 

permanently mad at you

for being more engaging

than her damn lessons

You push the bully girl

hard

She tumbles

She reaches for you

tears your green sweater

the only new thing

you own

I do not know 

how we found each other

or why we became fast friends

braiding each other's hair

yours, gold tinged red

mine, dark brown

we recognized 

wordless things

in the other 

I am trying to remember 

how you told me your secrets

all the trouble we got in

all the boys

all the recesses

spent inside

punishment for our glee

I do not know

how the hell I lost you

in this wounded world

But I think of you too often

How you gave me

tenderness and courage

what you saw in me

how you protected me

from the bully girl

and sometimes 

from myself

I met you again

recently

at Lime Square Poets

you were reading one of your poems

Yes, brilliant

I thought

You have not lost your rage

your red hair

or your word filled talent

---

Margarita Bonifaz published her first poem, Fairy Toast, at age 7 in the literary journal The Phoenix.  During her 32-year teaching career she wrote mostly in the margins. Two of her stories were published in Peregrine Journal: Summer's Dance (1992) and Dr. Mercuvio and the Velvet Couch (1995). In recent years, she has taken her novel out of the drawer and has countless stories just sitting on her desktop. The only reason she is writing poems is so she has something to read on Thursdays at Lime Square Poets. She loves wild geese, Queen Anne's lace, astronomical twilight and believes in the medical value of sugar. 

Again and Again

By Catherine Ronan

Hermes carries my love to you on winged sandals of desire.

In that myth of soaking rain, I steal a thunderbolt.

Splashing between dream and reason, I am the beast.

Minotaur of your mind walking with hand-spun thread of fate.

As huntress, I shear your golden fleece of carnality.

Helios cannot rise for three days before our friction draws fire.

Pain of obsessive love demands we must drink exile. 

Eris carries discord as the terrible lizard of sleep.

Black bile of memory spits anarchy.

We are perfectly flawed humans for now.

Tomorrow, we wake in the milky vault of galaxies,

and begin again and again and again.  

---

Catherine Ronan holds a degree in Applied Psychology and French. Writing poetry since childhood, she returned to UCC to study Creative Writing in 2019.

Since then she has joined multiple poetry collectives, performs on open mics, is a member of Debarra’s Spoken Word Team and created her first poetry film ‘Policing Mary’. Her work has been chosen for Poetry in the Park and Heritage Projects.

She won the Winter Solstice Poetry Competition, was long listed for Cúirt and highly commended in the Munster Literature Fool for Poetry Chapbook Competition.

Published both nationally and internationally, her debut poetry collection ‘ Elemental Skin ‘ was published by Revival and has been nominated by them for the Piggott, Forward and Heaney Poetry Prize. 

Cliffs of Moher

By Mary McColley

And waves combed out the old hair of the sea

The froth the blue the mangy strands

Above, the puffins, above, the wind tried to pull

my hair from my head and marry me to the sea

The grass leaned so soft against my skull, I

watched slant-eyed birds shelved in their nests,

beaks backwards, necks pale, paired, and

drowning above the sea-roar, I

watched brown wind blow on the clifftops & so much grey

dissolved to sky, I watched with limestone in my pocket,

put cold hands to my face and

couldn’t say anything

First published in 2022 by Wingless Dreamer, Sea or Seashore.

---

MARY McCOLLEY is a writer and poet originally from Maine. She has wandered and worked for a number of years in France, Thailand, and Palestine. Her pastimes include killing lobsters and selling street art.