Your Sestina

By Laura Campos

A- space

B-sunflowers

C- skin

D-stop

E- poem

F-door

A-you needed space

B-but we could be sunflowers

C-growing together, touching skin 

D-and never stop

E-like a co-written poem 

F-no exit doors

F-my open door 

A-the bed now has much more space

E-I’m back to writing poems

B-and drawing dead sunflowers 

D-I don’t think i’ll ever stop 

C-not until i can feel the touch of your skin

C-the open wound on my skin

F-and the open crack on the front door

D-I wish i could just stop

A-tell me how much you need space

B-you’re the sun, i’m the sunflower

E-following you like the verses of a poem

E-my poem

C-feels like the coldness of your skin

B-and the rotten dying sunflower

F-I’ll just leave the open door

A-waiting for you to regret your space

D-waiting for sadness to stop

D-“I can’t stop!”

E-tell me how to drop the pen, stop the poems

A-the constellations don’t guide me from space

C-my stars are the freckles on your skin

F-which fell and hit the door 

B-onto a field of sunflowers

B-oh, dear sunflower

D-make my tears stop

F-walk into the door

E-and get out of my poem

C-your skin against my skin

A-sharing the same space

Irish Luck

by Elisa Peirano

I'm pacing out of the Dublin airport. Wind is blowing in my hair and raindrops make my jacket damp. Here I am, finally In the Anglo-saxon capital of literature and playwriting. 

The flight from New York was long, I could not sit still. I feel nostalgic about leaving my home town. 

Last month, Julie, my editor, screamed from her office "Sarah, we need to talk!”

I raced into her office, "You wanted to see me?”

She stared at me, showing no satisfaction, “I am going to be very blunt here, but you aren’t an asset to our newspaper anymore, I just can’t keep someone who isn't useful. Why don't you take some time off, and get inspired?” Julie took a long and deep breath, “And maybe we’ll take you back.”

I understand what Julie was taking about: all my columns have involved yellow cabs and tall buildings. I decided that I needed a change in pace, a story that would define who I really am.

Before moving here, I spent nights sitting in front of my computer, typing the words ‘Dublin’ and ‘literature’ into Google, I really wanted to be prepared for my trip. 

And then I find myself here, racing through the city of Dublin. I can’t get enough of the pubs, libraries are theaters. I have been looking into James Joyce and W.B Yeats the most. I had studied them in high school but I had never noticed how grand their work was until I moved here. 

I am walking thought the streets of Dublin and I am pulled into peaceful tune a young woman is playing on her violin. I turn around and an old man is smoothly moving a long paintbrush on a small canvas. I am mesmerized by the amount of art in one street, in one town.

The Irish people have been raised with a belief: they either want Ireland to be free from the UK or they wanted to be one united country. This quality allows Irish people to be unique and this is what I needed to learn from them. I needed to believe in something, something that defines me.

As I am watching ‘The Risen People,’ I feel suffocated in the amount of passion people have in their own country. I usually sit back, take notes and sometimes I get a few ideas for a future column or short story I might write. 

I look to my right and an interesting young man is watching the play as if he truly believed it.

The curtains close. “Hello, are you enjoying the play?” I ask.

“I’m loving it, I’m Jacob, nice to meet you.”

I hold out my hand, “Sarah, Sarah Oakley.” 

Jacob stares down at my green notebook I’ve been scribbling down on all night on and says, “What is it you’ve been writing?”

“Nothing, unless you’re interested in a very boring idea for a story I might write.”

“Well, who says I’m not interested? May I take a look?”

I am startled that someone would want to read my notebook, but I gently pass it to him. 

The curtains open and I whisper, “You better not read too much!”

After the play, we go to a pub and discuss our careers. We stay up until 3 o’clock in the morning and I show him my portfolio. It turns out he is an aspiring editor and is fascinated by my New Yorker point of view on Ireland. He takes a few pieces of my writing and wants me to turn them into a column for his newspaper: ‘The Dublin Times.’

        As of now, I am not sure if I will have a future in Dublin, but all I know is that I have leased my apartment for another month.

A Beautiful Nightmare

by Pedro Irrera

It was a grey Halloween night, just like every other year William and his friend Maude were given the permission by both their families to go around the North Inner city neighbourhood trick-or-treating.

It was a typical October evening in Dublin. A cold wind was blowing, shaking the few autumn leaves left on the trees. The streets were filled with puddles, which had formed during the afternoon’s heavy showers. The air was chilly and humid.Everything looked and felt like many of the other Halloweens William and Maud had spent together. Little did they know that that evening was going to be very different.

They decided to meet at Merrion Square, around 9 pm.  William had always been an obscure boy, keeping his feelings and thoughts to himself. But with Maud it had always felt different. They had been friends forever and he knew he could rely on her. It was 9pm, William on time as usual, spotted Maud coming from a few blocks away. Observing Maud’s shadow getting closer to him, William was overwhelmed a sense of discomfort. It was as if he felt somehow that this was going to be a different Halloween from all the past ones. They ran to the first door and knocked loudly, nobody answered. They waited patiently for someone to come out but nobody was there. Tired of waiting, William and Maud went to the next door and knocked a few times. No one there.

The next house was in Fitzwilliam Place, about two or three blocks away from William’s house, it was thought to be a haunted house, nobody came in, nobody came out from there. William had always prided himself as being braver than everyone else and Maud knew it. But unlike him, she was more cautious. It was as if they compensated each other. Though different, both had a free revolutionary spirit, never afraid of getting in trouble when they felt it was for a just and noble cause. Just a few months earlier, for instance, they had ignited a mini-revolt in their school when a group of English students had decided to occupy the football pitch during lunch breaks. Maud and William refused to leave the pitch and led a large group of students as they they reconquered their right to play football during their break.

This spirit for adventure was also what had brought them together in front of this house that Halloween. Although Maud protested, as she too felt something creepy in the air, William knocked on the door. Again no one answered. Yet unlike what had happened in front of the other homes, William decided to let himself in. He kicked the door, and when he turned away he heard a squeaky sound and saw Maud’s face which had turned extremely pale. He turned around and saw the door had opened.

Obviously the first idea that went through his mind was to run inside the house, and that’s what he did. He heard Maud mumbling behind him, as she followed him.. 
The house was dark, there were no lights on, and every step you made you could here the floor creak. “Is anyone there?” William shouted. He waited for an answer, but all they could hear was silence.

He walked up the stairs as slowly as he could. He turned around to check on Maud. She wasn’t there anymore. As if she had vanished in thin air.

“Maud?” said William, nobody replied. “Maud where are you?” he screamed desperately. No answer.

Then he saw her laying in a a pool of blood at the bottom of the stairs. Large grey filthy rats raced over her. William screamed so loud he woke up from this terrible nightmare.  Maud was next to him reading a book of about the Irish Revival.

“What’s wrong?” she asked jolting from her chair.

“Nothing,” he said. “I dreamed that someone had died in a strange place.”

A light ray of sunshine peered through the clouds outside his window, and came to rest on Maud’s shoulder. It had been a regular Halloween after all, William thought.
Or maybe not?

Fading into Black

by Rebecca Branca

I watched as the curtains were drawn for the last time tonight.

“Finally” I muttered to myself. My parents had dragged me to yet another one of the Abbey theatre’s long and badly acted plays. I looked down at my phone checking the time for what seemed like the hundredth time this hour. The screen showed 8:30 pm, meaning I still had time to make it to my friend Chelsea’s surprise party. I looked over at my parents who were happily chatting away with another old couple. Beginning to grow more and more impatient I looked back down at my phone, where I had received a text from my friend Kate telling me to hurry up. I looked back up at my parents who were still conversing with the old couple. “Mum, dad, please! We need to go now or I’ll miss Chelsea’s surprise!” I whined desperately.

After saying goodbye, my parents and I made our way through the rain, to where our car was parked. ‘Ugh’ I groaned, looking down at my clothes that were now completely saturated from the rain. Typical Dublin weather I thought to myself. I glanced down at the time, 8:50 already?

“Crap” I cussed under my breath. “Dad can you drive any faster? You’re going so slow!” He turned around and glared at me:

“The road is slippery from the storm, unless you want us to have an accident I suggest…” but my dad was cut off by a horrific sound of crunching metal. Then it all faded into black.

Floating, that’s what it felt like. Like I was floating high above the clouds. But something was wrong. I tried opening my eyes, but I couldn’t. I suddenly became aware of a burning ache that took over my body. I kept fighting to open my eyes, and when I succeeded, I instantly regretted it. My eyes burned and my ears rang. I looked over to where my mum was previously sitting, to find her body laying limp, with blood covering her face. The windscreen in front of her unconscious body was completely shattered. I struggled, trying to lean over and grab her but when I tried an electrifying pain coursed through my body.

‘Ava, can you hear me? Ava please?’ I heard a distorted but audible cry from next to me. I turned to see a blurry face that looked a lot like my fathers and once again everything faded into black.