{"id":1374,"date":"2008-09-12T16:43:33","date_gmt":"2008-09-12T16:43:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ink.verticalplus.co.uk\/archive\/?p=1374"},"modified":"2008-09-12T16:43:33","modified_gmt":"2008-09-12T16:43:33","slug":"new-writing-by-john-irvine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/new-writing-by-john-irvine\/","title":{"rendered":"New writing by John Irvine"},"content":{"rendered":"

Fish Fingers<\/span>


A small candle on the table <\/span>
washes her blue eyes violet<\/span>
as she twirls the long stemmed yellow rose<\/span>
that matches her dress.<\/span>

I hand-feed her tidbits<\/span>
from the shared bouillabaisse<\/span>
fish crab mussels<\/span>
she sucks the saffron-coloured juice<\/span>

slowly<\/span>

from my fingers<\/span>
and licks my palm<\/span>
never mentions her husband once.<\/span>

We do it outside in the restaurant car park<\/span>
standing in shadows<\/span>
up against an old frangipani<\/span>
urgent and quick<\/span>
her arms around my neck<\/span>
strappy shoes dangling from one hand<\/span>
creamy blossoms float down<\/span>
around us like perfumed snow.<\/span>
She leaves her knickers in her handbag<\/span>
when I drive her home.<\/span>
 <\/span>
In her driveway is an old orange BMW<\/span>
with an indistinct figure inside.<\/span>
\u2018Shit!\u2019 I whisper. \u2018Is that your old man?\u2019<\/span>

\u2018No.\u2019 She kisses the tip of one finger<\/span>
and places it delicately on my lips.<\/span>
\u2018No, it\u2019s just my other lover.\u2019<\/span>



* John Irvine is a regular IS&T contributor \u2013 and this may be based on a true story.<\/span>

<\/font><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Fish FingersA small candle on the table washes her blue eyes violetas she twirls the long stemmed yellow rosethat matches her dress.I hand-feed her tidbitsfrom the shared bouillabaissefish crab musselsshe sucks the saffron-coloured juiceslowlyfrom my fingersand licks my palmnever mentions her husband once.We do it outside in the restaurant car parkstanding in shadowsup against an […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1374","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-prose-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1374","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1374"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1374\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1374"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1374"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1374"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}