Winnow and Worn | Haiku

Line of flying geese in a v-shape

Morning folks,

A couple of spring/summer haiku for consumption today…

Line of flying geese

Winnow

Geese skein winnowing

Across a low, scudding sky.

Thrumming, northwards-bound.

Worn

Summer putter of

River water gutter and

Foam on smooth worn rock.

*Thanks for reading, folks. Image courtesy of Pxhere and Pxfuel. My recent short stories include ‘Wean’s Crabbit‘ and ‘Property for Sale – Grim-on-Wye’.

Matthew Richardson is a writer of short stories. His work has featured in Gold Dust magazine, Literally Stories, Close to the Bone, McStorytellers, Penny Shorts, Soft Cartel, Whatever Keeps the Lights On, Flashback Fiction, Cafelit, Best MicroFiction 2021, Writer’s Egg, Idle Ink, The Wild Word, and Shooter magazine. He is a doctoral student at the University of Dundee, a lucky husband, and a proud father. He blogs at www.matthewjrichardson.com and tweets at https://twitter.com/mjrichardso0

The Scramble for Stories | Article

Everyone loves a good mystery. Where we used to gather around campfires, now we cluster around flatscreen televisions or curl up with our Kindles. Stories are how we approach liminal spaces within our psyches, with conjecture, narrative, and counter-narrative serving to titillate and inform.

Society’s appetite for stories is so overwhelming that we forget that their retelling is sometimes invasive. During the disappearance of Nicola Bulley near the River Wyre in January 2023, people flocked to the area to take selfies and to carry out their own investigations. Sky and ITV approached Bulley’s family after a body was found, despite their express wish for privacy[1].

It is tempting to link such exploitative behaviour and the prioritisation of story over protagonist to modern mediums such as TikTok and YouTube. However, long before electronic media made communicating a matter of moving our thumbs across mobile phones, stories were shared via word of mouth, over wirelesses, and in print.

Continue reading “The Scramble for Stories | Article” →

Property for Sale – Grym-on-Wye | Short Story

Corroded metal bolt on an old wooden door

Arryn Road, Grym-on-Wye

£30,000

Flat

1 bedroom

1 bathroom

40 sq. m

Tenure: Freehold

Greys Estate Agents is pleased to present a rarely-available investment opportunity. The property requires substantial renovation and updating. Buyers are advised to take this real estate opportunity at face value. Local newspaper articles often exaggerate, and a professionally-produced home report is available on request.

Property description

The accommodation comprises entrance vestibule, combined kitchen and lounge, bathroom, and bedroom.

Entrance vestibule

Extensive security measures on the front door bely what is now a very safe neighbourhood. Visitors are advised to ignore the smell. The key to the property will be underneath the door mat in the common close. Prospective buyers are asked to show themselves around the flat.

Combined kitchen and lounge

Albeit without modern amenities, the kitchen is surprisingly well appointed. Extensive cupboard space is complimented by an antique double range – unusual for a property this size. The range is in excellent condition, despite having seen much use. There is some damage to the room in the form of carvings in the skirting boards and what appears to be a symbol in faded paint upon the floor. A decorator is needed as a matter of urgency. The room comes appointed with excellent quality blackout blinds and, unusually, sound-proof insulation.

Continue reading “Property for Sale – Grym-on-Wye | Short Story” →

The Promise | Book Review

The Promise

Damon Galgut

293 pages

ISBN: 9781784744069

£16.99

Penguin Random House

Hardback

Review

Salome has served the Swart family for years. A Black South African, she has seen to the needs of Rachael, her husband Manie, and raised the couple’s three children – Anton, Astrid, and Amor. As Salome tends to a dying Rachael, the white matriarch of the family, she is promised her own house and plot of land on the Swart farm. Years pass, and Rachael’s spoken promise rests with one family member after another. South Africa, though, is a country coming to terms with Apartheid. Old promises are broken whilst new ones are made, and the word of a dying woman is blown away on the winds of change.

Continue reading “The Promise | Book Review” →

Wean’s Crabbit | Short Story

Wean’s crabbit. Wee pudge-balled fists fleein’ every which way, from side a crib to gummy mooth, scrunched eye socket to ma maw’s knitted blankit. Slevers and tears smeared across those ragin’-red cheeks.

Teethin’ sae he is. Ma pinky gaes in for a sook, but it’s naw what he’s wahntin’. That foot in the onesie’s fair workin’ as well, fat wee knee shudderin’ wi’ ev’ry stomp.

Liftin’ him oot his crib, the blenkit near enough comes wi’ him. The wean turns, mouths, but yeh’ve nae luck son – yer da’s got nothin’ for you. Sook all ye want. Aye, cry then, wee man, scream the hoose down. Wake the dug, the neighbours, a’body, why not? Fat lot of good it’ll dae ye.

We’re stuck here together, ye and me baith, son, in the box room before break a day, each as much use te yun another as tits on a bull.

*Thanks for reading, folks. Image courtesy of Doug8888 on Flickr. My recent short stories include ‘Frost and Fight’ and ‘The Dead Don’t Moan’.

Matthew Richardson is a writer of short stories. His work has featured in Gold Dust magazine, Literally Stories, Close to the Bone, McStorytellers, Penny Shorts, Soft Cartel, Whatever Keeps the Lights On, Flashback Fiction, Cafelit, Best MicroFiction 2021, Writer’s Egg, Idle Ink, The Wild Word, and Shooter magazine. He is a doctoral student at the University of Dundee, a lucky husband, and a proud father. He blogs at www.matthewjrichardson.com and tweets at https://twitter.com/mjrichardso0

Frost and Fight | Short Story

Dirty mattress and discarded clothing on an urban street

There’s no tradition here, no mistletoe or icing the cake. Frost does however come right through my mattress, through three fleeces and two jackets.

Warmth comes in cups – lentil today. The volunteers have bloodshot eyes and worn chatter. They’re smiling, and fighting.

Fighting against more than just a cold wind.

*Thanks for reading, folks. Image courtesy of Flickr. My recent short stories include ‘In the Ribboned Fog‘ and ‘The Dead Don’t Moan’.

Matthew Richardson is a writer of short stories. His work has featured in Gold Dust magazine, Literally Stories, Close to the Bone, McStorytellers, Penny Shorts, Soft Cartel, Whatever Keeps the Lights On, Flashback Fiction, Cafelit, Best MicroFiction 2021, Writer’s Egg, Idle Ink, The Wild Word, and Shooter magazine. He is a doctoral student at the University of Dundee, a lucky husband, and a proud father. He blogs at www.matthewjrichardson.com and tweets at https://twitter.com/mjrichardso0

In the Ribboned Fog | Poetry

A leaf covered in hoar frost

In the ribboned fog of a February daybreak, dog barks stilt strangely in the dank air. Hoar frost clings to raw-fingered branches and to the tortured holly. What leaves are left from autumn’s mulch sit skeleton and crisp, drifted in between tree roots or huddled at the entrances to abandoned setts. Clouds scud over the lightening sky, looking upon their skulking brethren clinging to the dells and corries below. A time for paperboys and farmers, milk floats and commuters huddled bitter at some rural bus stop. The sensible stay put – the foxes in their underground fugues, the hares in frozen, clod-circled forms.

Continue reading “In the Ribboned Fog | Poetry” →

The Dead Don’t Moan | Short Story

The dead don’t moan.

Dirt-packed and clod-mouthed, they stare silent at earthen skies.

Rain gutters down the slate tiles and the stained-glass windows. It bubbles down into the drain gratings, down through the salt-leached soil. down amongst the dead, where it sits brackish black and silent in the cheapening pine boxes.

Yew roots curl around the sleeping dead, whose wayward ivory pates are held soft in wooden elbow crooks and bark fingers. The shifts and shivers of the topmost branches do not trouble the subterranean silence.

Continue reading “The Dead Don’t Moan | Short Story” →

Curlews and Cows | Ayr Writers

One of the best aspects of being a member of Ayr Writers is the variety of outside speakers we have in our programme. Writers are by their nature storytellers, and we’ve had some fantastic yarns spun to us in my time as a member.

Some of the most interesting talks have come from (to my mind at least) unusual sources. We’ve had workshops on writing song lyrics and publishing via Mills and Boon, both of which taught me things about writing of which I was previously ignorant.

Continue reading “Curlews and Cows | Ayr Writers” →