Vicki Morley

      Weather Gods Winter arrived early in 1443. Prickling air laden with ice needles sweeping down the lagoon snow blankets shutting out light. Galleys half-finished abandoned. I fled from noise of cracking timber hulls my eyelashes matted with snow. I...

Jeremy Proehl

      The Candlemaker’s Office was sparsely filled. The worn brass door knob — a patina countless hands slipping over its surface, polished and discolored by each touch. That oak door — turning my wrist lean into it fighting the rub door against frame...

Padraig Rooney

      Making is finding, troubadours know Making is finding, troubadours know, and all that comes to hand is an oarlock socket worn by salt, its oar somewhere freely parting water and a pilgrim soul finding rhythm. Have him push the boat ashore at...

Michael Bartholomew-Biggs

      Workshop exercise For Kate Foley The river twinkles on my right. I’m walking briskly past a pair of disused shipyards whose noisy histories have been condensed to fit on plaques as neat as boiler-plates. The river’s banks are fidgety with ripples...

Philip Rush

      The Last Carthusian The large metal bell with which I call myself to prayer is wanted by a museum. I sing in an affected accent the responses to the psalms but the jackdaws which laugh at me from the roof are not fooled. In a refectory which is...