Tag: Nature

Fragile Castings | Poetry

White signposts pockmarked brown.

Grass sprung from tyre-trodden tracks.

Impotent cartography on shifting green and umber –

Urban creep, crawling back.

From corset-clad, rocks,

Overhanging

                        gossamer roads,

To drystone walls riven

With lichen and slate-shifting press of green.

The village-hemmed-in.

The                  trees                 canopied,

Foliage fingered across

Quivering telephone wires and fading contrails.

Concrete hauteur and mono-blocked pomp –

Temporal veneers over

Heave of hill, over

Relentless nudge of slender white root.

What hold county border

And matchstick boundary fence

On ragged geese skeins

Or paw-padded range of wolf?

Fragile castings

Atop grinding earth, beneath broiling sky.

*Thanks for reading, folks. Image courtesy of Wikipedia. Recent stories of mine include ‘The Wind off the Clyde‘ and ‘Alder, Beech, Hawthorn, and Hazel‘.

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, 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

Bustle and Beat | Haiku

Good morning folks,

I was out in my garden this week when a skein of geese flew overhead. The sight always reminds me of The Book of Merlyn in T. H. White’s The Once and Future King and Lyo-Lyok the goose talking to Wart on the mudflats about freedom and war. White was a passionate bird watcher and his enthusiasm is apparent in what is a beautiful piece of writing. The slim ‘v’ in the sky provided the inspiration for this set of haiku.

Bustle

Bustle, bill, and honk.

Restlessness on the mudflats.

A glance, a stretch, flight.

Beat

A white-fronted front,

Chevroned against the turquoise.

Wings beating northbound.

Things I’ve read this week…

Chris Hall’s ‘The Facility‘ microfiction series is a wonderfully dark and twisted dystopian tale. She is not new to keeping her readers hooked through these series, with each snippet having its own narrative arc within the wider story. She makes us feel the white tiles and dull chrome of the The Facility. She makes us smell the disinfectant and hear the echoes in the long, stark corridors. Wonderful stuff.

Chris Terrell’s commentary on choice of subject for sketching is a lovely insight on an artist’s process. I had a look through Chris’s work and loved it.

*Thanks for reading, folks. Images courtesy of Wikipedia and Pixabay.*

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, 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

Splay and Spate | Haiku

Good morning folks,

amidst the heat, a couple of waterborne haiku to keep you cool…

Splay

Mist-borne, gully-birthed.

A glance below, a damp breath…

White splayed over grey.

Spate

River-worn and time-scoured.

Cast aside by spates gone by.

Waiting for Fall’s rush.

Things I’ve read this week

One of the benefits of being part of Ayr Writer’s Club over the past year has been being introduced to other authors’ writing. It really is a talented group of people, demonstrated by the awards won at the Scottish Association of Writers 2021. Marion Husband’s ‘Explore Govan‘ is a product of one such writer. I lived within spitting distance of Govan for five years, and there are myriad gems in this little book which surprised me. Marion’s tour takes us from Govan Ferry to the Riverside Museum, from Elder Park Library to Govan Old Parish Church. There are so many things that I drove past on a daily basis with a past, a story. Marion brings these buildings and their history to life. This is a fantastic book for those visiting the area, and indeed for those more au fait with Govan.

E.E.Rhodes’ ‘Self/Less‘ won the Federation of Writers Vernol Equinox competition, and it’s easy to see why. In form and language, it really is a beautiful piece of writing – five minutes of your life well spent.

*Thanks for reading, folks. Images are my own and are taken from near Steall Falls, Glen Nevis. My recent writing includes ‘Night at Kinlochleven‘ and ‘HMS Cleopatra‘.

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, 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 Stretch | Short Story

Clink of bottle upon rock and cackle of teen laughter lie light upon the damp river air. It is cold. When hands are not cradling cheap cider they are thrust inside puffer jackets or, in the case of the boys, down jogging bottoms. Breath billows into the night along with swearing so thick it has become a tic rather than a conversational trait.

The boy pauses, crouched above the water. Six feet of rushing, peat-stained froth separate him from the drunken cheers of his classmates and glory. Six feet between him, the southern softie new to the area, and acceptance. The goading is loud in his ears, but both he and his fellow students know that the Stretch is no laughing matter.

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