Category Archives: Short Stories 2

My Name is…

MY NAME IS ANNIE MAUNDER

FROM SWEET STRABANE I CAME

MY FATHER WAS BILL RUSSELL

A FINE PRESBYTERIAN

HER FRIENDS CALLED MAMMY HESSEY

SHE BORE HIM SIX STRONG WEANS

SHE EDUCATED ALL O F US

AT HOME “THE MANSE” IT’S NAME

MATHEMATICS WAS MY LOVE

ALL DETAILS TO AND FRO

IN BELFAST TOWN I DID EXAMS

AT LADIES SCHOOL   – THEN

WITH SCOLARSHIPS

TO CAMBRIDGE TOWN DID GO

SINTON COLLEGE WAS MY HOME

FOR TWO FINE YEARS AND MORE

THE FIRST OF MY SEX FROM IRELAND

A SENIOR RANK TO EARN

THEN I GOT WORK IN GREENWICH

I TOOK PHOTOS OF THE SUN

AND SUNSPOTS AND ECLIPSES

AND CORONAS, ALSO PLUMES

AND I BEGAN TO EDIT, AN ASTROMICAL BRAND

OI MARRIED WALTER, SOUL MATE, STAR MAN

WE TRAVELLED NORTH AND SOUTH AND EAST AND WEST

TOGETHER HAND IN HAND

WE SHARED A COMMON PASSION

AT HOME AND IN FAR LANDS

THE SUN, THE, MOON, THE STARS, THE SKIES

ALL CONSTELLATIONS IN GOD’S GREAT PLAN

WITHOUT SOUBT THE NAME OF ANNIE MAUNDER FROM DERRY ROAD STRABANE IS TRULY WRITTEN IN THE STARS

Today I’d leave my Gallony home

The 3rd of August had quickly come
I looked around my Gallony home
The dress lay on the bed end rail
My sleeping sisters slumbering there

My father’s step above
Drew me to the open loft of the wee house
Mother and father since I was six
Today he’d walk me to St Theresa’s Church

My eyes fell on fiddle and bow
My Galloney home warm with songs and marching tunes
My sleeping sisters in their bed
Oh how I’d miss the fun we had

My father Pat’s palm work worn and rough
Strokes my hair and bade me dress
“Today St Theresa’s will see the
Loveliest bride to grace her altar rails.”
The 3rd of August of’38 came on winged feet
My sisters smiling in their sleep
Oh how I’ll miss their company
Today I leave my Gallony home to wed
Gemma C Hill 2020

And how are ye puttin’ in yer day

photo image gemma hill
And how do you put in your day
She asked me most sincerely
I stilled my thoughts and said
Very well – truth be told
My sons visit me regularly
Guard me like a fine work of art
Outside not inside new house rule

Nieces and nephews facetime me
The new me
Video chats and Social Media

Some days I pull on my shoes
And social distance in number 8
Now they even have a chair for me
Strategically place at the garden gate
Or tae-in-me – hand – when desperation sets in

Box sets now the new social norm
Late night viewing habit forming
And to my ecstatic delight
The VHS that took up space
Under the television set for many years
Fixed in a jiffy by my handy son
Gives me hours of endless craic
Watching old video tapes
Us makin’ eejits of ourselves
Packed cheek-to-jowl in my mother’s house
Sons, daughters, grandkids, in-laws,
Outlaws and the neighbours ‘n’ all
A Welcome Home Party in ‘87 for my sister Kathleen

So, as they say in Donegal
I’m puttin’ the time in rightly
And
Lookin’ forward to seeing’ you, unmasked
When we can smile
Not just with our eyes
Chat and socialise over coffee or wine
Or whatever takes our fancy
What do you say to that?
Gemma hill 2020 ©

My Friend Fionnuala

On a dark day some years ago now I asked my friend Fionnuala to pray for me and my family who were suffering from the effects of alcohol addiction. She laughed. “Well now,” she said,” I’m not great at the praying but I could clean my cooker for you. “I hate cleaning the cooker,” she continued. “I could offer that up.”
Domestic violence, child sexual abuse and abuse of the elderly are commonplace.
Closed in together as families are now is like a tinder box waiting to ignited or a pressure cooker waiting to explode.
Action speaks louder than words, they say.
If praying words is not your thing, could I ask you to tackle a chore or task you have been putting off and offer it up that the hands and feet that abuse be stilled this Easter Day.
Gemma Hill April 2020

THE LAST BREATH

Six months ago my husband died from pneumonia. For 6 days and 6 nights he fought for every breath.
At the dawn of a new day he drew his last breath. It was a Tuesday. We were all there with him.
Someone somewhere is dying alone today.
I ask at some time each day would you take a quiet, calm breath and offer it to someone who is dying breathless without family and friends.
Your breath and your thoughts will be there with them. They will not die alone.
Gemma Hill

Lazy Snow

image courtesy of Joe Canning
We peer from behind our window blinds
Lazy snow falling soft and slow
Like individual exquisite works of design
Just when we thought it was safe to forecast
The days are stretching
It nearly spring
Lazy snow soft and slow
Like small individual exquisite works of design
Bites us on the ass
And smiles
A wee present of snow and slippery ice
To let the child in you escape
Embrace the memories of the times
With socks for gloves
And feet like blocks of ice you dragged the sledge
Over the glittering ground
And fought your fear as you took your turn
G C Hill©

J is for joy of new decade new year
A is for always being thankful for what I hold dear
N is for nourishment for my soul from good people I meet
U is for unfriending those that bring me pain and grief
A is for acceptance of things  I cannot change
R is for risk-taking and living through my  fears
Y is for yielding to the 365 days to come and living and cherishing each and every one
GC Hill 2020©

2020

The final days of December dawn
2019

Called in the time
Hurried us towards the finish line
When we wanted to linger cling on
To Life in all its imperfect forms

Dark December days at last
Give way slowly to January light
Stretched further to lighten the dark
The light at tunnel end not yet in sight
But Hope eternal will survive

When one door closes
Open your eyes
Open your heart
To the open threshold yet to come
GC Hill 2019 ©

Fashionable Times

The Singer sewing machine hummed
Sets free the toil of the spinning wheel
Then the sixties ushered in the factories girls.
Outfits for every contingency
Psychedelic colours and loud designs

Now bless my soul it steals my sight
Clothes piled like works of art
Abseiling from chairs like birds in flight
Or hanging rejected
Shop mannequins on the backs of doors
Buyer’s remorse
Never worn

Along with the Botox and fake tan
A new outfit every turn round
No best kept for Sunday prayer
And the lament on an invitation out
“There’s not a stitch in the wardrobe to wear.”
And that is just the men!

God be with the days I say
When folks had fever clothes to wear
And fewer flimsy pieces of tartles to
Dance and fling themselves about
Outrageous attention-seeking scraps of underwear
As the rotary does a circle of the yard
The viewing public to entertain
GC Hill ©