<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
His Daughters<\/strong><\/p>\n It wasn’t the life you’d imagine. We kept our heads down Wild hair flying, clumsy, I’ll never forget his face that last time <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Joanne Key<\/strong> won 2nd prize in the 2014 National Poetry Competition, and first prize in the 2018 Hippocrates Open Prize. She was the winner of the 2018 Mslexia Short Story Competition.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n A Blessed Virgin Grows Up<\/strong> There was so much Mary at Christmas.<\/p>\n I, too, was a handmaid, Advent nights, I waited Headlights feathered the ceiling. But the next day Once, a man drove one hundred miles Years drifted This Christmas What do I keep in my heart?<\/p>\n How far I\u2019ve travelled in the dark. <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Catherine Ayres<\/strong> is a poet and teacher from Northumberland. Her collection, Amazon<\/i>, is published by Indigo Dreams. She is currently studying for a PhD in Creative Writing at Northumbria University.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n While the Wise Men all Gather on Important Business<\/strong><\/p>\n the women have been left they have been left the stories of great men the devil has begun taking confessions will push them over, and roll them away.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Amelia Loulli<\/strong> is a poet living in Cumbria. A pamphlet of her poetry was selected for publication in Primers Volume IV in 2019, and her work has been twice shortlisted for the Bridport Prize. She is currently studying her MA in Writing Poetry at Newcastle University.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" His Daughters It wasn’t the life you’d imagine. Most nights\u00a0he\u2019d be out, on the sherry early doors. Closing time, he’d come back\u00a0and start. Exploding over nothing, he’d throw his tea at the wall, smash the place up, scatter elves like skittles. He slept where he fell and pissed himself. We kept our […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[114],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20880","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-the-twelve-days-of-christmas-201920"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20880","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\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20880"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20880\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20954,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20880\/revisions\/20954"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20880"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20880"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20880"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nMost nights\u00a0he\u2019d be out,
\non the sherry early doors.
\nClosing time, he’d come back\u00a0and start.
\nExploding over nothing,
\nhe’d throw his tea at the wall,
\nsmash the place up,
\nscatter elves like skittles.
\nHe slept where he fell
\nand pissed himself.<\/p>\n
\nand got on with the jobs.
\nThere was nothing\u00a0merry
\nabout any of us.
\nNot dainty. Not delicate.
\nWe were big girls,
\nbuilt for the donkey work,
\nlugging\u00a0boxes and sacks of toys
\nfrom the workshop by day,
\nnights in the loading bay.
\nMore of a father to strangers,
\nhe’d turn on us and say:
\nWho’d want you lot any way?
\nUgly buggers.<\/p>\n
\nwe weren’t born for shining
\nor finery, couldn\u2019t be trusted
\nwith delicate mechanisms
\nor finishing touches,
\nbut we knew hard labour
\nand every one of us could lift
\na toddler\u2019s weight in trains.
\nAt the end of the day
\nthere’s only so much you can take.<\/p>\n
\nhe staggered in, Jack Frost in tow,
\ncovered in snow, an abominable man,
\nbrandishing a hammer.
\nI’ll give you bloody Christmas\u2026<\/em>
\nBy then we’d all come of age \u2013
\ngirls that could turn
\nskipping ropes into snakes
\nwith a flick of a wrist, each tail
\na fist shaking a baby\u2019s rattle.
\nA rage so great it woke an army
\nof sleeping dolls. Angel-faced,
\nthey climbed down from the shelves \u2013
\nall the beautiful daughters
\nhe’d ever wished for,
\nmarching towards him in their clumpy shoes.<\/p>\n
\nBut Mary kept all these things, and pondered them in her heart \u2013 Luke 2:19<\/em><\/p>\n
\na quiet girl,
\nuntouched by man<\/em>.<\/span><\/p>\n
\nto be chosen
\nby the angel
\nwith miraculous eyes.<\/span><\/p>\n
\nMy open book bloomed\u00a0 lily-white.<\/p>\n
\nalways came
\nwith its ordinary dawn.<\/p>\n
\nto bring me gifts.
\nOnce, I was with child.<\/span><\/p>\n
\nand all prayers were lost.<\/span><\/p>\n
\nI will listen to the owls shout.
\nI will sleep with curtains open
\nso the moon slides
\nacross my thighs.<\/span><\/p>\n
\nHow no one told me I could choose.<\/p>\n
\nin stables, unarmed.
\nBy turns they have claimed
\nwhat they had to hand, and now wield it
\nagainst whoever comes close. By God\u2019s grace<\/p>\n
\nsmall as babies, love songs useful as star signs,
\nyet this winter they are asking questions, like, how
\nmany daughters did Mary have? By nightfall<\/p>\n
\nand if things stay this way, soon, one woman
\nwill kiss her own arm, remember
\nwhat pleasure feels like, and then, even if the men
\ncome home, sturdy and deep as barrels, the women<\/p>\n