I’m very moved by this poem by Polly Clark from Afterlife, her New and Selected Poems coming out next month from @bloodaxebooks.bsky.social
24.01.2026 09:02
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I’m very moved by this poem by Polly Clark from Afterlife, her New and Selected Poems coming out next month from @bloodaxebooks.bsky.social
i am running into a new year By Lucille Clifton i am running into a new year and the old years blow back like a wind that i catch in my hair like strong fingers like all my old promises and it will be hard to let go of what i said to myself about myself when i was sixteen and twenty-six and thirty-six even thirty-six but i am running into a new year and i beg what i love and i leave to forgive me
Always worth a post
Black-and-white still from ‘It’s a Wonderful Life’. George Bailey stands alone on a snowy street at night. He is caught in the moment just before throwing a snowball.
Merry Christmas’
Christmas ornament of books image with text: can you write our future? Festive greetings and submissions window open soon. 'Hello! thank you for reading Bending The Arc. We're so glad to have you with us on this journey into the future. BendingTheArcMagazine.Substack.com.
Tis the season to manifest a brighter, joyful future. If you fancy submitting to #BendingTheArcMagazine in January, find all the details and read Edition 1 and 2 here: bendingthearcmagazine.substack.com/p/can-you-wr.... Submissions open: Monday 12th January to Sunday 1st February 2026. Can't wait!
Northodox Press 25% off until 5th Jan
📣Announcement!📣
My debut novel, Dwell, will still be published in 2026 by @northodoxpress.bsky.social, despite changes there, but is now going to come out in June not Feb.
If you preordered, thanks. Those preorders remain valid. If you haven’t, why not do that now with 25% off code NORTHODOXMAS?
Announcement graphic reading ‘Introducing the Winners of The Paul McVeigh West Cork Residency 2026’. The winners listed are Carol Farrelly, Greg Thorpe, and Stephanie Torrance.
This will be a wonderful start to 2026! Thank you so much to Paul McVeigh and the judges, Cathy Galvin and Hilary White. 😊
paulmcveighwriter.com/news/
Thought I might post some short stories for advent - but I may be overestimating my industry & your interest
Still, here's day one at least - something quietly astonishing from the great David Means in Zoetrope www.all-story.com/preview-exce...
(Not an excerpt despite what the link says)
There's only one week left to apply for a 2026 New Writers Award! Tell your talented writer friends. . . 📲
Someone needs to start a literary prize for short story collections. It seems really odd to me that we don’t have one in Ireland or the UK. Before everyone shouts about the Edgehill Prize, it doesn’t seem to be happening this year.
Did you know? Swifts eat, sleep, drink, mate, & even bathe on the wing...rarely landing except to nest.
They can switch off one half of their brain to rest, drink by gliding low over water to take sips, & fly through rain to bathe! 🌧️
#SwiftAwarenessWeek
📽️ @theHALLofEINAR
EAVAN BOLAND MOTHER IRELAND At first I was land. I lay on my back to be fields and when I turned on my side I was a hill under freezing stars. I did not see. I was seen. Night and day words fell on me. Seeds. Raindrops. Chips of frost. From one of them I learned my name. I rose up. I remembered it. Now I could tell my story. It was different from the story told about me. And now also it was spring. I could see the wound I had left in the land by leaving it. I travelled west. Once there I looked with so much love at every field as it unfolded its rusted wheel and its pram chassis and at the gorse- bright distances I had been that they misunderstood me. Come back to us they said Trust me I whispered. poetryfoundation.org
I started to read a book which quotes this poem by Eavan Boland as epigraph and it blew me away.
“Night and day / words fell on me./
Seeds. Raindrops./
Chips of frost”.
www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazi...
Paul Durcan wrote this, but I feel he had the soul of a hare as well
Thank you, Jonathan!
I always look forward to reading through these anthologies each week, so I’m chuffed my story has featured.
Featuring Personal Anthology debuts for:
Carol Farrelly @carolfarrelly.bsky.social relly.bsky.social
Tracy Fells @theliterarypig.bsky.social ypig.bsky.social
Alice Fowler @alicefwrites.bsky.social writes.bsky.social
Hana Gammon
Robyn Jefferson
Ross Raisin
So congrats to them!
Thank you! ❤️
My anthology includes stories by @demimondaine.bsky.social (Robyn Jefferson), @theliterarypig.bsky.social (Tracy Fells), @carolfarrelly.bsky.social (Carol Farrelly) @alicefwrites.bsky.social (Alice Fowler)
And from @flyonthewallpress.bsky.social
Thank you for including my story in your anthology, Rue!
Fellow authors, I love you, and I know it feels like we don’t have a choice, but B&N and Am*zon both scheduled sales this week to preempt Independent Bookstore Day, a hugely vital source of income for indie bookstores. Please don’t promote their sales; please promote your local indie this week.
Yay! This is exciting, Lynsey!
Woman with long ginger hair and a black top facing the camera with the title Polygon Aquires Kin by Lynsey May above it
My creepy new novel will be clawing its way out of the woods and onto shelves, with a big thank you to Polygon and my awesome agent Sara Langham
birlinn.co.uk/2025/03/13/p...
Happy Birthday! 🥳
Photo of my novel, FOR THY GREAT PAIN, face out in Waterstones, with a staff recommendation shelf sign.
Piles and piles of my novel, FOR THY GREAT PAIN, in all its bright blue beauty.
Happy first birthday to this electric blue paperback baby! 💙 FOR THY GREAT PAIN HAVE MERCY ON MY LITTLE PAIN explores the lives of medieval mystics #JulianofNorwich and #MargeryKempe.
Winner of the Saltire First Book Award and a Book of the Year in the Guardian, Sunday Times and Irish Times! 😍📚
P.S. If you like your owls, I’d recommend ‘The Company of Owls’ by Polly Atkins. I loved that book!
Thank you, Vicky!
And the book is interesting. Some owly research for a short story…
A writing desk with a window view of gorse, fields and distant snow-capped mountains.
My happy place.
#MoniackMhor
Jenni Fagan’s ‘visceral’ memoir of growing up in care wins Gordon Burn prize
Final tweaks to Jan Morris's wonderful 'A Venetian Bestiary' before it goes to the printers. It's going to be a gorgeous pocket sized hardback. New Introduction by the author and journalist Sophy Roberts.
Publishing in April.
Feel free to pre order here!
www.littletoller.co.uk/shop/books/l...
That’s put a spring in step! Thank you so much, Vicky, for these kind and lovely words. ☺️
P.S. I’ve started sending out that story… all the better for your perceptive eye.
Thank you, Lynsey! ☺️
