ISSN 2053-6119 (Print)

ISSN 2053-6127 (Online)

Featuring the works of Gerard Sheehy, Gavin Bourke,

Arsalan Chalabi & Bawar Maroofi, Michael Boyle,
Nancy Anne Miller, Susie Gharib, Fred Johnson, Issue 87 Decade
Richard Halperin, Gary Beck and Souran Kurdpour.
Hard copies can be purchased from our website.
edition 2019
A New Ulster Editor: Amos Greig
Prose Editor: E V Greig
On the Wall Editor: Arizahn
Website Editor: Adam Rudden
Contents
Editorial

Gerard Sheehy;
1. Power Sharing

Gavin Bourke;
1. The Past is Present Tense
2. Transcending Mind Movements
3. The Breaking Waters of catharsis
4. The Never Heard
5. The Death of the Shepherd

Arsalan Chalabi trans Bawar Maroofi;

1. America
2. I wish, alike the sun, I wouldn’t see the dark nights
3. God

Michael Boyle;
1. A Child of the Forties
2. Inkwell
3. I Have Forgotten the Way to Dreenan School

Nancy Anne Miller;

1. No One
2. No One Here to Tell
3. Envelope
4. Tooth Fairies
5. Pitch

Susie Gharib;
1. Embargoes on Light
2. The Ferryman
3. The Penitent Oscar Wilde: A Reading of De Profundis
4. Refugees
5. In Times to Come II
6. A Dwelling
7. Zenith

Fred Johnson;
1. 1941
Richard Halperin;
1. The Death of Dali
2. People in a Dairy
3. Landowska Plays Bach
4. Madly Singing in the Mountains

Gary Beck;
1. Motifs
2. Measurements
3. Winter Gift
4. State of Disunion
5. Machine Learning VI
6. Determinant

On The Wall

Souran Kurdpour;
1. Several drawings

Message from the Alleycats

Round the Back

 Poetry, prose, art work and letters to be sent to:
Submissions Editor
A New Ulster
23 High Street, Ballyhalbert BT22 1BL
Alternatively e-mail: g.greig3@gmail.com
See page 50 for further details and guidelines regarding submissions. Hard copy distribution is
available c/o Lapwing Publications, 1 Ballysillan Drive, Belfast BT14 8HQ
Or via PEECHO
Digital distribution is via links on our website:
https://anuanewulster.wixsite.com/anewulster

Published in Baskerville Oldface & Times New Roman

Produced in Belfast & Ballyhalbert, Northern Ireland.

All rights reserved

The artists have reserved their right under Section 77

Of the Copyright, Design and Patents Act 1988

To be identified as the authors of their work.

ISSN 2053-6119 (Print)

ISSN 2053-6127 (Online)

Cover Image “Catalina” by Amos Greig

“It is during our darkest moments that we must focus to see the light. ” Aristotle Onassis.

Editorial

It isn’t every day you get to write an editorial celebrating the end of a Decade but that
is exactly what I’m doing. Ten years ago I started my journey into further education and
eventually this magazine after attending sessions with a Psychiatrist. They advised that I get
out and try to challenge myself as part of my coping mechanism for the Depression, learn
something new.
I signed up with an adult learners course at SERC and it was the Access to
Humanities option, at no point had I considered following it into University but the support
they gave and the encouragement I received especially for my English Literature module led
into attending Queen’s University Belfast and eventually graduating with a JS HONs BA Eng
Ancient History degree. Technically I’ve graduated four times from Queen’s over the years.
Unfortunately, I also graduated with a permanent debilitating life altering spinal
injury which left me in constant pain and needing the use of mobility aids to get around so
yes ten years of constant agony isn’t fun. I lost hope several times along that path the pain is
at times so debilitating that it can affect mood, suicidal thoughts were a problem. Still I had a
great support network and helped see me get through it.
A New Ulster has been running for seven years now and over the last year and a bit
there have been some issues getting it out on time, Windows 10 bugs and incompatibility
issues with some of the hardware on my computer even though it isn’t that old has seen m
losing internet access at the most inconvenient of times. Then of course there have been
health issues hospital appointments and so much more that sometimes it doesn’t feel like
there are enough hours in the day. Yes this was meant to be the December issue is technically
is but it is also the end of a Decade so here it is late but live none the less.

Amos Greig Editor.

Biographical Note: Gerard Sheehy

Gerard Sheehy is from Limerick City. He had a chapbook published by

Revival Press a number of years ago. His poems have appeared in a number
of publications.
Power Sharing
(Gerard Sheehy)

Once sat down and the intimacy of aftershave

and tension have been shared

words will have to follow.

At first they may all be formal

and some still seasoned with spite

but perhaps also there will come a day when

a certain sentence may stray across the table

a sentence spoken in the comfortable language

we save for relaxed moments

for when we are in the company of friends.
Biographical Note: Gavin Bourke

Gavin was born in 1977 in Tallaght, Dublin, where he lived for twenty-four
years. He holds a B.A. Degree in Humanities from DCU and a Masters
Degree in Modern Drama Studies from UCD. He has worked in Library
Service for twenty years. He has worked in Mobile Library Services for
both South Dublin County Council and Dublin City Council serving some
of our most marginalised communities. He worked as a librarian and
outreach manager in Coolock Library for eight years. He was appointed as a
Senior Librarian in 2017. He was shortlisted for The Redline Book Festival
Poetry Award in 2016. His work covers a broad range of subject matter
including nature, time, memory, addiction, mental health, human
relationships, politics, contemporary social issues and injustice as well as
urban and rural life, both past and present. He is married and lives in
County Meath.
 The Past in the Present Tense

(Gavin Bourke)

Wings of black concealing white underneath.

The light went on for a short time,

in the window with the steel bars.

Another victim of a bad call, hung-up.

Reminders of the long-gone, barricaded,

prevented from euthanasia by the hand.

Blocked from every angle in hard triangles,

sentenced to catatonic sedation.

Cold, shivering, suffering in suicidal silence,

on a bed of mania’s grips and psychoses trips.

Coming and going spontaneously

like a whip’s cracks on the pre-frontal cortex

and amygdala.

Psychoses left to suffer together in shelters,

legacies of cultural stigmas.

Transmissions of attitudes transcribed,

unwritten from generation to generation.

without intention.

Waking to nightmares of the mind and reality,

misunderstood by the fraternities.

 Transcending Mind Movements

To go too far in any way,

into dichotomousness.

Movements towards preoccupations

with the within,

not with the balance of the totality

of the within.

A few hundred years of thinking,

blinded not to see the self,

the life,

the struggle,

through the eyes of the total totality

of everything,

within the theme

of the overall grand scheme.

Finding solace under silver birches,

forgiveness to our bullies?

Outside the in and inside the out.

Protruding through broken brackets

on the axis of the spine of yesteryear.

Normal-abnormal, abnormal-normal.

Possible, all said and done before.

Originality at all?

Through the same canals and structures.

Unoriginal originality, a death-like horizon for the price

of the journey or trip? Inescapable?

Wastage of time, reacting to the unnecessary,

real and imaginary.

From the ground, laid down,

to walk again slowly an inch at a time.

A re-ascent from flesh on a skeleton over time,

around the course, letting go,

of the remnants of old identities.

 The Breaking Waters of Catharsis

Water began to drip,

flowing into caskets,

neither real nor imaginary,

but somewhere in between.

Flowed down from the tops

of the highest walls,

into the nearest rivers,

of darkest deepest brown.

Tributaries and tributes in teardrops, unmasked,

to peer out over chimney pots

into blue skies without clouds.

Nowhere to hide,

from the truth of this ride.

No one has their own answers,

could have been this,

could have been that,

if they had done this, that,

that, this, if they had not.

Unknown unknowns at best.

Dealing with consequences, circumstances,

no quick fixes.
No morphine for the mind.

Grief breaking through cracking breast bones,

releasing drops at intervals,

through a clenched fist.

Not the beginning of the end,

but the end of the beginning,

seeing through new eyes

slowly forming.

To relearn life again and again,

is to be truly human.
 The Never Heard

An aunt of an aunt

in Portrane.

An uncle of an uncle

in Mullingar.

Never seen,

never spoken of.

Never photographed,

often imagined,

may never have existed.

Numb,

struck dumb,

beyond the square root

of the lowest common

denominator.

Down the ghost road,

never alluded to,

visiting houses.
 The Death of the Shepherd
(For Seámus Ó’Domhnaill)

A chain without a cross,

a cross without a chain.

He could work a scalpel

and thread a needle,

like the finest of fishermen.

The herd turned upon

the shepherd,

a hoof at a time,

seared through his back

beyond imprints.

Hammered like pastry,

simultaneously,

instantly to absence.

Back to life,

memory,

remembrance,

reverence.
Biographical Note: Arsalan Chalabi translated by Bawar Maroof

Arslan Chalabi, a Kurdish poet and writer, was born in the

city of Boukan in Kurdistan of Iran in 1987. The 2 books of
his poetry were published between 2009- 2014 in
Kurdistan. Now, he is living in Denmark as social and
political refugee since 2015.
These magazine published the poem of Arsalan Chalabi:
The "Anthologies poétique de Flammes Vives" magazine in
France
The “A new ulster” magazine in Ireland in January 2018
The “Hvedekornr” magazine in Denmark in 1_ 2019
The “Recours au poème” magazine in French in 2019.
Poems by Arsalan Chalabi
Translated from Kurdish by: Bawar Maroofi

1.
America

Our hands
Have lost the streets independent lines
Let us all kill the whole asphalt roads
Set fire to the palaces
And scratch the US Dollars by our sick fingers!

You are bursting into

t
e
a
r
s
And America attacks your eyes
Your eyes, which are now two homeless pigeons!

2.
"I wish, alike the sun, I wouldn't see the dark nights"*

I wish I were at a madhouse, my pockets full of butterflies

I would present my jacket to the clouds
And would ask the moon a cigarette!

I wish I would embrace myself wearing a red scarf

And would burst into tears in my shoes!

*The title is a verse by Hemn Mukriyani, a prominent contemporary Kurdish

poet
3.
God

God has influenced streets, neighborhoods, buildings

God has embraced cars, taxis, buses, motorcycles, bikes
God is aware of polices, thieves, killers, prostitutes, drug smugglers
God looks at a girl who sits in the street, pissing
God observes men fucking their wives
God takes metro with no tickets
He shall not pay as He has a pizza at an Italian restaurant
He goes to cinemas to watch movies
He stands at a speech desk in parliament, approving new laws
He goes to voting centres to vote
God wears on His suit with a tie every morning and drinks espresso
He is a climate activist, collecting plastics in the garden once a week
He likes pasta and does not smoke cigarettes
He is a Messenger of Peace and ask for peace and welfare for all nations in the
world
He is an American citizen and a presidential candidate of the coming elections
in the United States!
Biographical Note: Michael Boyle

Michael Boyle is a native of Lavey in South Derry N.ireland .He has

number of poems published in the “The Antigonish Review”. “
Dalhousie Review.” “Tinteain” and “New Ulster Writing.” In 2014 he
won “The Arts and Letters” prize for poetry. He is working on
completing his first poetry collection “Drummuck.”

Michael is an Irish Language speaker and has also written articles for the
Irish language magazine “An t-Ultach

In June 2017 he presented a paper in Magee College Derry on the Irish

poet Seamus Heaney. In 2018 he gave a talk “Echoes from the Barn
Barrel.” to the

North American Celtic Language Teachers Conference.

Boyle is an independent scholar and he operates the famous historical

walking tours in St.John’s Newfoundland. www.boyletours.com
A Child of the Forties.

(Michael Boyle)

My first breath and cries of a child happened in my mother’s ancestral house “The Burn”in
Glenone. After about a week I came to Drummuck for the first time. I wasn’t aware at the
time but the mid-forties rationing was still in effect.

There were food shortages of certain items and this continued well into the late forties when
things improved.

HANDS

When I was about two years of age my grandmother took me out a wooden box that served
as my playpen. Then she said.

” Now look at his ever so tiny little hands.”

My father had just come in the back door with a bucket of fresh milks as he had just milked
the cows. He continued.

“You know when young Micheal grows up he will be a good help with the hay but I do be
thinking he won’t be that much of farmer or even a dealing man.”

So talk about predestination for me I wouldn’t be a farmer but there was never any chat of
what I could do. With out strong hands there was little chance of working at construction.
So many jobs required were manual and even today you can identity a persons occupation
by looking at their hands, In a sense from the get go there was an air of envibilty So what to
do with my life.

TEETH

One cold frosty morning when I was about four a cousin of ours from county Tyrone Mrs.
Mary Sweeney came to our house collecting money for the African Missions. Even though
times were tough after the war my mother gave her a small donation to the cause. Now the
kicker came just before she was leaving she looked me straight in the eye and said.

‘Oh my blessed little one you are so special.” Then she turned to my mother

“He has a gap in his front teeth and this means that he will travel away from here and he
will never be able speak our native tongue.”
My mother was glad to show her the door and was clearly upset enough to ask for her
donation back.

HAIR, MOUTH EYES AND EARS.

When I was small I was conscious very early in life that I was different. I had blazing fire
engine curly red hair. I stood out a mile away. Added to this I had thick lips protruding and
large Celtic ears. I had to endure name-calling and later more of a racial taunt and I once
heard the N word. Some suggest that taunting of red heads is the last taboo but I must say
when I went to local school this was never a problem. We had a large number of red haired
families like the Cushleys, Grants and Hamills. We were not a minority and all my
classmates respected red haired students. They knew ,of course not, to tangle with my good
friends Donard and Joe Hamill and my brother Brian. I had very small eyes and very often I
was affectionately called “googley eyes” I have mentioned already about my grandfather
‘Deef” Harry. My mother was always concerned about my hearing and once she took me to
a specialist in Magherafelt hospital. The surgeon had a gruff blunt manner and told my
mother make sure that youngster washes his ears.

FEET.

Many older people have remarked that I never ever did crawl as an infant but I always
seemed to run. At an early age I could run jump in my tiny black gutty slippers. Of course
this meant I could run away from danger or at other times I could run into an unknown
danger just ahead of me. At an early age I didn’t have any idea of looking before you leapt.
Today, as I reflect on the pattern of my life I feel more information and advice would have
helped in some of my decisions in later life.
…………………………………………………INK WELL

(Michael Boyle)

The oak bolted desks always had the ink well on the right.

Teachers warned southpaws hold tight to their knitting spool,

And never ever lean heavy on your nib with all your might.

Inky blobs and blots, smudges and spots. Oh what a sight.

Inspectors report the methods of how to hold pen properly.

The oak bolted desks always had the ink well on the right.

Inky fingers and inky clothes, that inky face- what a fright.

Friday morning monitor fill wells from the bottle with a spout.

And never ever lean heavy on a nib with all your might.

Blackboard, double desks, high windows and fading light.

Chalk and slates, wooden floors, blotting paper, pens and nibs.

The oak bolted desks always had the ink well on the right.

The writing in our transcription books shining blue bright.

Stuffed with paper or gum -but now our own ink well decays.

And never ever lean heavy on your nib with all your might.

Ideas spring from deepest wells on to black ink cartridges.

We will all move like Calvino’s ghost to empty ink well.

The oak bolted desks always had the ink well to the right.

And never ever lean heavy on your nib with all your might.
I HAVE FORGOTTEN THE WAY TO DREENAN SCHOOL
(Michael Boyle)

I have forgotten the way to Dreenan School.

Blue bells and the wooden style at the Scrog,
moss lane with brambles, burrs and blackberries.
Hollow Lane and the slow climb up McCann’s hill.
Got tree branches there for Palm Sunday
and juicy apples in the fall.

I have forgotten the way to the Crow’s Nest.

Tall foxgloves grow on either side of the lane.
I have forgotten the story of how Hugh Kelly
gave my Uncle Barney two gold sovereigns
on his journey to Amerikay in 1929.
Slurped water in my hands
from the helmet pump, and how I raced
my brothers’ home barefoot on hot July days.

I have forgotten the way to make yellow sparks

sliding with hob nailed boots on the road
and play ice hurley outside the school gate.
I have forgotten the way to plays cowboys on Kane’s rock.
Hide in the hollow of the tree where the Redcoats
hung the priest for saying Mass in penal times.

I have forgotten the way through fog, drizzle,

showers and heavy rain. Once I fell in the river
and got a bad wetting. No mitts, our hands froze blue,
left our soaked coats to dry all day before going home.
Waited mornings for the stove to heat the icy milk bottles.
With the small high windows I have forgotten how dark
it got on winter afternoons.

I have forgotten how some students tip toed

on Dreenan Bridge wall. I have forgotten how golden
the whins bloom in spring along Carnaman Lane.

I have forgotten the way to Dreenan School

blue bells and the wooden style at the Scrog.
moss lane with brambles, burrs and blackberries.
Tall foxgloves grow on either side of the lane. And
how I raced my brothers’ home barefoot on hot July days.
Biographical Note: Nancy Anne Miller

Nancy Anne Miller is a Bermudian poet with seven poetry collections. Boiling Hot (Kelsay
Books 2018) is her most recent. She is published internationally in journals such as
Edinburgh Review, Poetry Ireland Review, Salzburg Review, Agenda, Stand, The Fiddlehead,
The Caribbean Writer. She is a MacDowell Fellow and Bermuda Arts Council Grant recipient.
No One

(Nancy Anne Miller)

No one visits their dead.

Tombstones a reminder of

Moses’ slab of laws brought

to and stuck in earth.

A personal wailing wall

where tears might soften

words carved in the testimonial

to the beloved’s death.

A name left to the elements,

seasons erase like from a child’s s

school tablet, because the numbers

written down don’t add up.

Neither

It isn’t like your tombstone

is the hatchet blade that buried you,

come un-hinged from the force of resistance.

Neither is it when shadowed at twilight,

the hangman's black head mask with

the tip disguising who pushes the lever.

But see it more like a marker for

a car parked, I can’t pretend you

can back out of, turn the wheel around.

No One Here to Tell
(Nancy Anne Miller)

The deer and her doe leaped onto

Wykeham Road from out of spring

woods as if trying to clear the yellow

line’s rainbow. Airborne and sudden.

That the coffee plunger’s ring

fell off when I pushed it down,

and careened sideways, like

a wooden cart wheel in mud season.

That a widow told me never

to buy a gaggle of bananas now

that I am alone. They all ripen

at once, fingers in too many pies.

Envelope

(Nancy Anne Miller)

The top of the gravestone points up,

stands like an envelope with the flap

opened, below it shadows into an

oblong shape as if death has written me

a letter. I know the contents as I sit in

my Jag, window down, and note the maple

is full blown green. Will send missives

come Fall down on your site, answer

back that life has been sweet, and bright,

full of nuance as every leaf tells,

before it curls up like an Egyptian scroll

then becomes the dust of the desert.

I think of the tips of the pyramids,

their geometric mountains of precision,

slaves like ants at work carry anything

in to fill the void. Packed for the pharaoh’s

journey, a time capsule of a life. I fold

a cotton handkerchief into a triangle, place

in your jacket pocket, make death gentlemanly,

so you can wipe your brow after a long trip.

Tooth Fairies

(Nancy Anne Miller)

How can death be made new,

but here your tombstone

boasts of it, as if just fresh minted.

I watched your coffin go

down into earth, a treasure

chest full of the riches of you.

Hidden there, like my secret,

your whereabouts otherwise

unknown. The earth and I

conspiring to tuck you

safely away. Now I know

this place is but a marker,

where the angels came

like tooth fairies hovering

over the stubbed fang

of your gravestone. Came,

wings, fountains spouting

water, to soften hard ground.

Pitch
(Nancy Anne Miller)

Gravestones on the Washington Green,

make the cemetery appear roomy, a display

of headstands for beds in a capacious

furniture store. Each one like the door

to the tomb Christ broke open. A gate into

the blue summer drift of an afternoon sky.

Tombstones, Christ Church, Warwick,

the blade in a cricketer’s bat which cannot

forever deflect the pitch of the sun’s ball.

.

Biographical Note: Susie Gharib

Susie Gharib is a graduate of the University of Strathclyde with a

Ph.D. on the work of D.H. Lawrence. Her poetry and fiction have
appeared in multiple venues including Mad Swirl, Southlight, The Blue
Nib, Adelaide Literary Magazine, A New Ulster, Down in the Dirt, the
Pennsylvania Literary Journal, The Ink Pantry, Miller’s Pond Poetry
Magazine, Impspired Magazine, Crossways, and Leaves of Ink.
..
Embargoes on Light

(Susie Gharib)

Shortly before our daily power cuts,

I switch my bedroom’s lights right off,
then close my eyelids with the utmost calm.

The light is extinguished of my own accord.

I think of Jesus on the Mount of Olives,
then open my eyes heavenwards.

They can deprive us of shabby lights,

confiscate oil tanks and a truant barge,
but who can put out a single star,
or shroud the moon with a mantle of spite?

Embargoes have not a political goal.

They torture the people whose only fault
is having been born by wells of oil.
The Ferryman
(Susie Gharib)

When ‘Don’t Pay the Ferryman’ Chris De Burgh had sung,

he warned against fixing a price to the hooded man
before one made it to the other end.
Mine neither charges gold nor cents.
It ascends.

It won’t be Charon when the time has come.

Mine has neither choler nor phlegm.
It neither sails on a river of boiling blood
nor ferries visitants to Inferno’s heart of red.
It soars instead.

It will be propelled by thoughts in my head,

my yearning to cross the threshold, to transcend,
to seek a star in Orion’s belt
and bathe in light every celestial second
until the end.
The Penitent Oscar Wilde
[A Reading of De Profundis]
(Susie Gharib)

In prisons, lessons of humility

are hard to learn by shut-up inmates
for rebellion is bred by infamy
and petrified hearts are hard to melt.

Small windows bar the gold and blue

that God had exuded from his brush.
Instead, grey creeps weaving more gloom
that steals into each ailing heart.

Days become insufferable twins

for sameness desperately competing.
Sunless and moonless, they turn and spin
in circles painfully excruciating.

Misery with tongue now grown so numb

has no discourse of agonies felt.
Anguish sobs, bewailing its lot,
while rage is white, quite impotent.

For artists life can't be conceived

without their mode of expression
but Christ took worlds of muted speech
and freed it all from suppression.

Through his eyes, the blind could see.

The deaf were lent attentive ears.
And those with tongues that had been seared
his voice gave them utterance.

When 'Forgive your enemies' Christ enjoined,

it was not in the enemy's interest.
He wanted to banish festering hate
from hearts where love is eminent.

When there’s no solace for those who err,

they into kind nature retreat
where rocks with clefts provide havens
and valleys refuge to weep in peace.

Water cleanses and fire purges.

Forests soothe with their hallowed hush.
Stars illuminate their nightly sojourns.
Winds wipe footprints with their rush.
Refugees
(Susie Gharib)

Disowned by what waters seas and leas,

a drifting log,
a wanton breeze,
a box of memories that boasts no keys,
a bare idea that's brought to the knees.

Distraught by every joy that flees

that heeds no prayers,
no pleas or Please,
that lingers for a moment
but only to tease,
a glimpse of what may be
but never is.

Disdained by policies overseas,

the sordid plagues of racial disease,
an alien across the seven seas
with no soil or rain to grow one's trees.
In Times to Come III
(Susie Gharib)

In times to come,
the snow will cease to chill
what slumbers on yonder hill,
my fluid will,
and wings that hate to stand still.

In times to come,
the air will breathe with ease,
unhampered by industries,
insulating disease,
wreathing with fragrance the texture that heals.

In times to come,
each fire we kindle will roam
in forests, at home,
illuminating each lawn
with the coolness of foam.

In times to come,
the earth will cease to boil
with floods and oil,
with wires that coil
tainting its soil.
A Dwelling
(Susie Gharib)

When I was a child, I always drew a house

with slanting roofs whose red bricks faced south.
A wide, white window overlooked a glade
across which a brook cascaded its way.
On pastures, flowers were left un-plucked.
They pleaded with children to touch them not,
so their necks were spared the twisting cut.

A tree that craved to embrace the skies

diffused its branches to recline on walls,
endowing the dwelling with emerald robes.

A cloud, betrothed to an amorous ray,

was swathed in gold for the nuptial day
while a ring of birds darted from dots,
rearing their wings in Vs and knots.

The air, made visible in random strokes,

exuded fragrance from lilacs and gorse.
A steed, unbridled, trotted with glee
with no wars or races to yoke or fray.
Zenith
(Susie Gharib)

What is the zenith of your mind?

Is it next-door,
the cosmos,
or the womb of a sprout?
A floating yacht on a delusive dream.
A gadget that divines the scheme of things.
A mansion of words, to lure a bird.
A colony of truths, to yoke one’s head.
An incubator that hatches Worldwide Peace.
A New World Order in the Middle East.
Flying saucers for sons and daughters.
A winnable war without any martyrs.
A cruise down the Thames of Planet Mars.
Acres of land but under no curse.
A packet of cigarettes that costs a dime.
A cardboard box, to shelter from crime.
A tiny flat with no burst pipes.
A slum devoid of suicidal drives.
A colorless flag for every nation.
A non-sadistic happy relation.
Biographical Note: Fred Johnson

Fred was born in Belfast in 1951. His most recent collection of

poems is 'Rogue States,' (Salmon Poetry 2019.) Fred has lived in
Galway for some years, where he set up CUIRT, Galway's annual
international literary festival.
1941

It was taken from the balcony, or somewhere in the Gods

The line of high-kicking girls is a blur of short-skirt white
As if light took its time leaving them, their leggy constellation
Rotating with infinite slowness or, arguably, light’s improbable
Speed: you can tell her fourth in from the photo’s right, stage-
Grinning with the rest, a tsunami of wartime rolls washing
Over the painted backdrop of a fat-winged comic airplane
Trapped in blade-sharp paper spotlights dull as smoke
The stage of The Empire Theatre full of ambush and shadows.

He played the Stage Door Johnny, so much he admitted

Together in coats blooming like parachutes in the oily wind
They’d link arms out of the Stage Entrance alley, take their
Time to a scarce taxi, canoodle in the back seat, her make-up
Powdering his double lapels, the streets under black-out rules
The scent of Mandalay opened his lungs like oxygen, he was
Light-headed, unsure; and if not tonight, then tomorrow
They’d come over again, grumbly airplanes full of fire and light
She’d be lined out in chorus high-step when the bombs fell.

FRED JOHNSTON
Biographical Note: Richard W. Halperin

Richard W. Halperin holds Irish and U.S. nationality and lives in Paris. His most
recent poetry collection via Salmon/Cliffs of Moher is Catch Me While You Have the
Light, 2018. His most recent collection via Lapwing/Belfast is Sunday Visits. His
work is part of the UCD Irish Poetry Reading Archive. Readings scheduled so far in
2020 are On the Nail/Limerick, 6 February; and the Heinrich Böll Memorial
Weekend,. 1-3 May/Achill Island
The Death of Dali

(Richard W. Halperin)

What can I say? Picasso means nothing to me

But Dali means some of whatever meaning means.

I’m not sure his death happened. He is still here.

Whatever took place in Figueres may have been

For the media. I remember always Salvador and Gala

At the Russian Tea Room, and our waiter – my wife’s

And mine – a middle-aged handsome man and sympathetic,

The model, when young, for Christopher Columbus

In the grand mural Dali painted for the back wall of

That wonderful restaurant next to Carnegie Hall.

The Russian Tea Room hasn’t died, it arrives in my flat

Unannounced. Dali I’m not sure of either. It and he were part

Of my life, and here I put question mark, question mark.

Buñuel too, but that’s another poem although his Robinson Crusoe

Was an Irishman. I do have to mention the Dali crucifixion

At the Metropolitan Museum, Jesus horizonal and feet first

Floating in infinite space. Genius, genius, genius. Photographic

Detail. Well, Dali, no? I write this at the local pizzeria, Paris.

I think I have to take a taxi home. I live around the corner,

But wine has been taken. To take a taxi home. A good

Definition of death, hein? – photographically.

We once sat next to Maureen Stapleton in 1975

At the Russian Tea Room and talked with her about

A wonderful short-lived play she had just been in,

The Secret Affairs of Mildred Wild. But I digress. Dali, did I say?

Well, The Russian Tea Room. Feet first, horizontal.

People in a Diary

(Richard W. Halperin)

On the train. The man seated next to me

Is alertly typing. We pass a glade of young trees.

In the scheme of things, each one a life.

Garbo’s face as Anna Karenina passes through

My mind. I open a letter from New York:

The Little Foxes – Lillian Hellman; language –

Is in for a long run. Certain delights. They arrive

Of themselves. People in a diary which I have

No need to write. I can face my newspaper now –

We’ll forget about whom the first page is about.

Positive things bob in the light. Dickens

Was nearly killed in a train crash, pages of

Our Mutual Friend went flying out of his hands.

He never was the same after it. Nothing is ever

The same after anything.

Landowska Plays Bach

(Richard W. Halperin)

Landowska plays Bach

She goes straight ahead.

She imprinted her Bach

In gum.

We can hear it

One hundred years later

Which is no time at all

In the mind of art.

I hear her play

In the midst of Yeats’s rant

On Parnell’s funeral

Which he also imprinted

In gum.

He also goes straight ahead.

He nails it:

There is no such thing

As an intelligent mob.

Landowska plays Bach.

She dragged her harpsichord with her

From country to country as she fled.

Virgil Thomson said

To those New York critics whinging about

That unwieldy instrument

She plays her harpsichord better

Than anyone plays anything.

Ditto late Yeats.

I live with them both.

I like things which have

No shadow in them whatsoever.

Madly Singing in the Mountains

(Richard W. Halperin)

For Paul T Dillon

Arthur Waley and Po Chü-I

Are not only ones madly singing in the mountains.

We are all madly pouring forth song.

Madrileños when I was in Madrid in 1985

Started the day at nine o’clock with coffee and a cognac,

At eleven o’clock a coffee and a bicky.

It is nine o’clock in the morning,

In Paris, in Greystones, and points west.

Biographical Note: Gary Beck

Gary Beck has spent most of his adult life as a theater director and worked
as an art dealer when he couldn't earn a living in the theater. He has also
been a tennis pro, a ditch digger and a salvage diver. His original plays and
translations of Moliere, Aristophanes and Sophocles have been produced
Off Broadway. His poetry, fiction and essays have appeared in hundreds of
literary magazines and his published books include 21 poetry collections, 7
novels, 3 short story collections and 1 collection of essays. Published poetry
books include: Dawn in Cities, Assault on Nature, Songs of a Clerk,
Civilized Ways, Displays, Perceptions, Fault Lines, Tremors, Perturbations,
Rude Awakenings, The Remission of Order and Contusions (Winter Goose
Publishing, forthcoming is Desperate Seeker); Blossoms of Decay,
Expectations, Blunt Force and Transitions (Wordcatcher Publishing,
forthcoming are Temporal Dreams and Mortal Coil); and Earth Links
(Cyberwit Publishing). His novels include a series ‘Stand to Arms, Marines’:
Call to Valor and Crumbling Ramparts (Gnome on Pigs Productions,
forthcoming is the third in the series, Raise High the Walls); Acts of Defiance
and Flare Up (Wordcatcher Publishing), forthcoming is its sequel, Still
Defiant); and Extreme Change will be published by Winter Goose
Publishing. His short story collections include: Now I Accuse and other
stories (Winter Goose Publishing), Dogs Don’t Send Flowers and other
stories (Wordcatcher Publishing) and The Republic of Dreams and other
essays (Gnome on Pig Productions). The Big Match and other one act plays
will be published by Wordcatcher Publishing. Gary lives in New York City.
Measurements

(Gary Beck)

I set myself a daily task

to prolong continuation

as long as I am functional,

for I do not wish to go on

if all I am is vegetable matter,

a mindless consumer

of nourishment through tubes

keeping me sentient

for no good reason

save my species reluctance

to concede to death,

even after life

has virtually departed.

So I’ll measure my performance

by my arbitrary standard

and savor my remaining time,

as long as I’m productive.

Winter Gift

(Gary Beck)

While snow is falling

in elegant ermine,

the city is transformed

from grey of concrete

to brief beauty.

But accumulation

impedes travel,

so quick removal

clears the streets,

leaving curbside drifts

of black urban filth,

yellow doggy urine stains.

State of Disunion

(Gary Beck)

Terrible events

ravage the land,

school shootings,

attacks on the elderly,

nazis strutting in America

denying democracy,

in a fractured government.

Intelligent people

fear for their children’s future,

the not-so intelligent

delude themselves with blind hope.

Endless war in the Mid-East,

empty stores in every city,

while the trumpeter-in-chief

rewards the rich,

punishes the middle class,

abandons the poor,

while poisonously tweeting

at anyone who opposes him,

alienating friends,
provoking enemies,

all the while proclaiming

all is well.
Machine Learning VI

(Gary Beck)

Millions of ‘bot’ accounts

impersonating real people

roam social media platforms

promoting commercial products,

attacking political candidates

and sowing discord.

Their fake images and news

are the envy of our leaders

who still mostly mislead us manually.

Determinant

(Gary Beck)

Persistence sometimes allows

constructive efforts

for something meaningful

leading to worthwhile conclusions

that will benefit others,

the value of the contribution

measured by how many are helped.

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: g.greig3@gmail.com 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”. Please note that submissions may be edited. All copyright remains with the original
author/artist, and no infringement is intended.

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!
Biographical Note: Souran Kurdpour

Souran Kurdpour was born in Boukan / Kurdistan of Iran. He draws,

photographs and makes short films.
He tries to show his views in a simple silent form that is visible to us,
whether in cartoons, photographs or other forms of visuell art.
His drawings/cartoons are and will be published in some countries at
various magazines, selected and won prizes in various competitions..
Souran Kurdpour
Souran Kurdpour
Souran Kurdpour
Souran Kurdpour
Butterfly by Souran Kurdpour
Politics by Souran Kurdpour
 2019s MESSAGE FROM THE ALLEYCATS:

Who would have thought that we’d be seeing the end of a

decade and still working away on the magazine. Where does the time
fly? It seems like it was only last week when we were busy making the
January issue meow!!.

Well, that’s just about it from us for this edition everyone.

Thanks again to all of the artists who submitted their work to be
presented “On the Wall”. 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”.
We continue to provide a platform for poets and artists around the world we
want to offer our thanks to the following for their financial support

Richard Halperin,
John Grady,
P.W. Bridgman,
Bridie Breen,
John Byrne,
Arthur Broomfield,
Silva Merjanin,
Orla McAlinden,
Michael Whelan,
Sharon Donnell,
Damien Smyth,
Arthur Harrier,
Maire Morrissey Cummins,
Alistair Graham,
Strider Marcus Jones

Our anthologies

https://issuu.com/amosgreig/docs/anu_present_voices_for_peace

https://issuu.com/amosgreig/docs/anu_poetry_anthology_-april