<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Punchline<\/strong><\/p>\n A man walks into a bar A woman irons a week The man walks into the night. She fixes her everyday smile (Coral Dream), A woman folds the narrow scarf of her life. <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Breda Wall Ryan<\/strong>\u2019s poetry and fiction is widely published in journals and anthologies and has won or been shortlisted in international contests, most recently the Fish Poetry Prize 2013. She has an M Phil from Trinity College, Dublin<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Punchline A man walks into a bar where the pint\u2019s on the house if he tells a good joke. He\u2019s always the life and soul, and tonight he\u2019s on form. Applause sweeps the bar like a tide till the barman calls time. A woman irons a week in an hour, matches shirts and […]<\/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":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5484","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-prose-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5484","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=5484"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5484\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5488,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5484\/revisions\/5488"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5484"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5484"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5484"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nwhere the pint\u2019s on the house
\nif he tells a good joke.
\nHe\u2019s always the life and soul,
\nand tonight he\u2019s on form.
\nApplause sweeps the bar like a tide
\ntill the barman calls time.<\/p>\n
\nin an hour, matches shirts and ties,
\nfolds T-shirts and pants into squares,
\ntucks grey socks into shoes,
\ntriangles ham-&-cheese into Tupperware,
\nsets the digital clock to Repeat.<\/p>\n
\nSomeone walking a dog on the pier
\nfinds his jeans folded
\ndry on top of his boots,
\nwallet and watch in the toes
\nwith a note that says only, \u2018Dear\u2014\u2019<\/p>\n
\nsteps into the street that leads to the shore.
\nThe bitten moon\u2019s womanly tug
\ndraws her into the tide.
\nIs she surprised by the last gull\u2019s cry,
\nthe slow breathing in, silence?<\/p>\n
\nA man walks into the sea. For how long
\ndoes he mean to die?<\/p>\n