Ms Tuesday Mundy, Mother of Two

Photo: Unknown woman with twin girls (Belgium, 1904).
From: Willesden Herald – Can you help trace the Willesden Morozoff family? (2016)

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MS TUESDAY MUNDY, MOTHER OF TWO

Bright sun with dark clouds before thunder.
A long labour with twin girls on a Sunday,
First in sunlight, then in rain. No wonder
She called them Gloria and Dolores Mundy.

Motion Aftereffect Illusion: The Starry Night by Vincent Van Gogh

🎨

The best way to see Van Gogh's "Starry Night" is to stare at the center of the spiral for 20 seconds and then look at the painting.

RT when it works for you. pic.twitter.com/SsEN8K0nSf

— Alexander Verbeek 🌍 (@Alex_Verbeek) September 15, 2022

Follow the instructions and prepare to have your mind blown!

The Starry Night by Vincent Van Gogh (1889) is currently in the the Museum of Modern Art in New York. Ref. Wikipedia

Every Time is the Last Ever

EVERY TIME IS THE LAST EVER

"We know not the hour"

How many more times will I walk downstairs
and what last things have I already seen?
The day before the night, the last round of the clock.
The year I went home, never to see Dublin again.
Our last Christmas dinner: that was it, no leftovers.
L’chaim! When we met in the pub in twenty-eighteen,
We shared those last embraces before the pandemic.
And the last poem I ever wrote, well is this it?

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Photo: Bathmat towel with a random thread that looks like the number 78 on it.

The Stepping Feet Illusion

The Stepping-Feet Illusion features two rectangles apparently moving like a pair of stepping feet, but they're actually moving at the same constant speed.

The illusion is broken when the striped texture is removed.

[source, read more: https://t.co/iyJoeSY7he] pic.twitter.com/UQyzoJLF52

— Massimo (@Rainmaker1973) August 13, 2022

2022 Writers, Don’t Let Me Down! Ed.

New Short Stories

Your forebears could hunt an epiphany through the great forest of Um without breaking a twig and spear it with words sharpened on the soles of their feet. Arise, put on your leotards and send in your short stories, ye of this century…(Enough, thank you. Get to the music. Ed.)

SUBMIT

One-Off Mug inscribed
The Willesden
Short Story Prize 2022

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Shtisel Said It All

SHTISEL SAID IT ALL

Nobody's dead, it's okay.
The people who made you
are in you. And those you knew,
whose folks were in them too,
came into you as well.
And the crowd of you mingled
into the crowd of them,
Late arrivals ringing, appeared
and oh the reunions,
the smiles, the sorrys,
and the laughter.

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Photo: The Bohemian Society, Dublin. My grandfather Peter Moran is seen in profile, seated on the right. I don’t know who the others are or the date, possibly late 1930s.

Last Day, Final Reductions

LAST DAY, FINAL REDUCTIONS

Wake up to
A bubble in my ear.
And in my other ear.

Sit.

A gap under the door.
The idea of a mouse exhausts me.

My attitude is no good.

My skin is no good.

                    My history is no good.

                    My character is no good.

                                        My personality is no good.

My behaviour is no good.

                                        My poetry is no good.

                                        I am no good.

                    Make a note.

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Photo: Mothercare store closed (Harrow, June 2022). Handwritten signs on the windows say “Last Day” and “Final reduction” .

That’s me reading poems at the Torriano Meeting House

12 June 2022: It was a pleasant Sunday evening of poetry and friendly chat, meeting local poets and listening to the top of the bill, Judi Sutherland’s commentary and excerpts from her epic poem, Following Teisa.

For the record my “set list” (because I’m like Bob Dylan y’know) was:

• Sonnet for Dandy
• The Holy Child of Sudbury Hill
• High-Flying Birds Know
• Outpatient segue to
• The People Who Did Good Things
• Winter Thoughts
• The Possibility of Skipping (Day of the Flying Leaves)
• In the Waiting Room of the Western Eye Hospital (Day of the Flying Leaves)
• Ballad (The Hour of Waking Alone)

As well as getting two poems out of my referral to the Western Eye Hospital, as I said at the Torriano, I also got this blog post, which should be subtitled “Angels or Demons,” and several other mercifully unpublished poems.

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Photo: “Frankie Pedantic at the Apollo” cartoon by Zoz (aka yours truly.)

Cotton On*

COTTON ON

The number of all the raindrops that ever fell on England
raised to all the snowflakes that fell on Japan
that number of words,
would not outweigh a pinch of wild cotton
as would make a pillow
for a dormouse.

On a mossy hill heads of cotton grass gently nod on the breeze. 🌾🌾🌾🌾#yorkshire #moorland #countryside #outdoors pic.twitter.com/fRhuwwONSs

— YorkshireShepherdess (@AmandaOwen8) May 29, 2022

* “Cotton On” is a rewrite of the poem “The Weight of Words” from Day of the Flying Leaves. I was inspired to rename it by the beautiful photos shared by YorkshireShepherdess on Twitter. (Stephen)

This Boring Man

I shared this on Twitter today. Previously unpublished flash fiction. (Stephen)