Writing.

Flowers – poems by Leela Soma

Jewels of summer A glance from the car at the traffic light My eyes widen at the jewel strewn scene Purple and white crocus, narcissi bright Like amethysts and diamonds that shine. Green grass with moist sun-touched dew Like glitter sparkling, under the bare tree. A north wind whips gusts strong The infant buds defiant, […]

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Aye Write 2019! Sara Sheridan introduces Anne Griffin and Anstey Harris 

Friday, 22nd March 2019 Mitchell Library Review by Mary Irvine The two authors being introduced were Anne Griffin and Anstey Harris. Both in the fifties, each has recently published her first novel. Anne Griffin is an Irish novelist living in Ireland. She has won recognition for her previous writings but ‘When All Is Said’ is […]

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Aye Write: Tribes of Glasgow review by Pat Byrne

I went along to Aye Write at The Mitchell Library to hear Stephen Millar and Alan McCredie talk about their book ‘Tribes of Glasgow’ (Luath Press) The book arose out of the writer Stephen Millar’s quest to rediscover Glasgow and capture its essence.  Born in Glasgow but having been brought up in and lived in […]

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Aye Write 2019, Tom Shields review by Mary Irvine

Aye Write Festival 2019 Tom Shields Mitchell Library Sunday, 24th March 1.15 p.m. One of the many things I love about Glasgow and its people is the humour, the banter and, at the above event, I was not disappointed. Tom Shields is perhaps best known for the humorous ‘Tom Shields’ Diary’ which appeared in ‘The […]

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Aye Write: Kamal Ahmed: The Life and Times of a Very British Man review Mary Irvine

Aye Write Festival Friday, 22nd March, 2019 Royal Concert Hall The main theme of Kamal’s presentation was the notion of being British. What is it that makes anyone British? What is identity? Kamal’s mother was white English, his father Sudanese, making Kamal mixed race or half-caste in the parlance of the70s/80s when mixed marriages were […]

Read the full article: Aye Write: Kamal Ahmed: The Life and Times of a Very British Man review Mary Irvine

Aye Write 2019: ‘It’s Not About the Burqa’ Mariam Khan, Amna Saleem’ review Mary Irvine

Aye Write Festival 2019  3 p.m. Sunday, 17th March, Mitchell library It’s Not About the Burqa: Muslim Women on Faith, Feminism, Sexuality and Race – Mariam Khan, Amna Saleem When, in 2016, Mariam Khan read David Cameron’s comment that linked the radicalization of Muslim men to the ‘traditional submissiveness’ of Muslim women, she felt she should […]

Read the full article: Aye Write 2019: ‘It’s Not About the Burqa’ Mariam Khan, Amna Saleem’ review Mary Irvine

Aye Write 2019: Henry VIII and the Men that Made Him Tracy Borman review by Mary Irvine

Aye Write Festival 2019  3 p.m. Saturday, 16th March, Mitchell library On her first visit to Glasgow this accomplished speaker and author of several books on the Tudor period held a sixty plus audience in thrall – in the nicest possible way – as she brought to life a different, more sympathetic, perhaps a better […]

Read the full article: Aye Write 2019: Henry VIII and the Men that Made Him Tracy Borman review by Mary Irvine

I Deserve This – a poem for Christmas by Calum Maclean

The talented Glasgow poet Calum Maclean reveals his thoughts on Christmas. I Deserve This I must’ve been the architect of some outrageous larceny, my henchmen thieving priceless jewels delivered to me personally. Presumably, I used that swag to fund an act of treachery, facilitated shady deals, created instability, ensured elections swung my way, indulged in […]

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Frohe Weihnachten – a Christmas Poem by Brian Whittingham

FROHE WEIHNACHTEN (My Christmas poem for friends old and new.) On Christmas Eve, mum softly sang Stille Nacht. Busy with final preparations. Scotch pine, I recall her telling dad. Best for keeping its needles. She clipped red candles onto green sprigs, placed small bowls of walnuts, almonds and hazelnuts at the base of the tree. […]

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Bluid Muin – Lunar Eclipse by Finola Scott

By Finola Scott

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Some Wintertime Poems by Finola Scott

Darkening So the Darkness approaches, I could talk of                                    enveloping black                                    the rip and reveal of the veil                                    stripped […]

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Goldie by Pat Byrne

There’s a small glen not far from our house. On a good day I go up there to read my paper. It’s quiet in the mornings apart from the odd person out walking their dog. Sometimes I sit for a while and watch the rabbits or maybe a fox – there tends to be more […]

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Glasgow Writers: Tom Leonard

Sadly Tom Leonard died today, 21 December, 2018. Wonderful poet and fascinating ‘citizen of the world’. PennSound Podcast: Tom Leonard in Glasgow 1978 Some Memories of Tom Leonard (1944 – 2018) – Richie McCaffery Tom Leonard – Glasgow Poet I admire Tom Leonard’s writing, his passion, his love of language and his fight against various […]

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Govanhill; no single-ends by Ian R. Mitchell

The Talk Govanhill is almost certainly the most intact area of working-class tenement housing left in Glasgow. Apart from on its north-eastern fringes, very few of the four storey blocks dating from the later nineteenth century have been demolished, and the grid-plan of the streets remains exactly as it was laid out over 100 years […]

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Tarnished Jewels, U.S.A.’s Public Lands Under Trump by Ian R. Mitchell

Ian R Mitchell, author of Encounters in the American Mountain West, examines the issues facing the USA’s public lands under Donald Trump’s presidency MANY PEOPLE, both in the United States and abroad, view the country’s National Parks as the jewel in its somewhat tarnished environmental crown. Travelling through the USA – especially in the staggeringly […]

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Reading Palms by Stephen Watt

Reading Palms As child, I conceptualised trolls beneath where the tolls were stationed, swiping seaweed-sticky fingers at cars commuting from Erskine, dragging all inside to the bottom of the Clyde then gorging on their bones. Such a little monster’s vision. Growing, the creatures faded leaving the bridge to sketch an impression on my young mind. […]

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Poetry: Lahore, I am coming by Rizwan Akhtar

Rizwan Akhtar works as an Assistant Professor in the Department of English, Punjab University, Lahore, Pakistan. He completed his PhD in postcolonial literature from the University of Essex. His poetry has been published in the the UK and countries throughout the world including:   Canada, India, New Zealand and U.S.A. Poems from Rizwan Akhtar’s first collection ‘Lahore, […]

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Autumn Makes Me Sad by Muriel Baker

Autumn Makes Me Sad   Seasonally Associated Disorder Referred to as SAD by those who think they know, that a little lack of sunshine makes us feel like forty degrees below. It’s a chemical imbalance. Think of hibernating mammals. We have the same inclination. So until the clocks change to longer days. It will be my […]

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A Story for International Day of Peace by Katie Stepek

I’d learned something of the incredible history of the Stepek family when I heard Martin Stepek speak at the Sikoski Polish Club in Glasgow a number of years ago.  This year on International Day of Peace, 21st September, 2018,  I read a very moving article written by his daughter Katie it brings home the plight […]

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Three Haibun by Robin Lloyd-Jones

Autumn Trail I walk a narrow track under miles of beech and oak. Strands of gold and red flare like forest fires amongst the greens. Bark steams when touched by the long-fingered sun. But the sky is darkening.      Canyons, cliffs, mossed walls      Submerged in wooded gloom      Fathoms from the […]

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The Indian Shawl a poem by Muriel Baker

Exotic birds of fantasy from the dyers vats of colour tamed by the hand of the weaver. Creatures from the imagination unreal and like no other. The silk worms die in boiling vats. The plants give up their colour to make a scarf, a shawl, a wrap for someone else’s mother. I hope the skill […]

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Plum Stone Throat a poem by Jen Gray

(For Helen X, c 1910-1967, who died of throat cancer) In Chinese medicine plum stone throat describes the feeling of a plum stone stuck at the top of the back of the throat. It is associated with stagnation of liver energy (liver chi). The liver is said to control the flow of emotions. Plum stone […]

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Crohn’s or: How I’m Learning to Stop Worrying and Love the Bag by Calum Maclean

The ninth of October 2013 was a big day for me. On that morning I felt the chill of porcelain against my bare thighs for the very last time. It was also my final day with all my original internal organs as that evening I underwent a surgery known as a Pan-proctocolectomy, which is digestive […]

Read the full article: Crohn’s or: How I’m Learning to Stop Worrying and Love the Bag by Calum Maclean

Autumn Visit to USA by Leela Soma

Fall in Washington DC As my friends in Glasgow are getting into their Autumn woolies, here in the Fall in DC it is still 90 degrees during the day and humid. Shorts and flimsy tops are de riguer. My summer has been extended by a few more weeks and I am relishing it, in air […]

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Lochwinnoch – a poem by Lindsey Stewart

Lochwinnoch Yachts sit silently on still water Soft white sails await life giving breeze Crew sit idly, breathing slowly Waves lap gently at the hull Seagulls circle overhead, beaks wide Screeching mockingly into stillness. Small child crouches by the water Finger points towards the reeds Jackdaw lands, tilts head in recognition Its yellow eye staring […]

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Living in Shoes – poem by Gail Winters

Living in Shoes New shoes, true shoes, even Clarks’ school shoes, wedges, sometimes no shoes, clean shoes, smelly shoes, fading away at the seams shoes, travelling shoes, fashionable shoes, kicking in the goal shoes, losing the sole shoes whilst singing the blues shoes, making your dreams come true shoes, safe shoes, dangerous shoes, mind the […]

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The Big Chair – Autumn Voices – Robin Lloyd-Jones

Robin Lloyd-Jones And what a big chair it was! Robin Lloyd-Jones looked like a pixie – size wise that is! Loved the concept of the Big Chair. Looking at six photographs selected from your life would really tax anyone methinks. Probably reveal a side of you never before realised. Robin started with a photo of […]

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Corn Dollies by Mary Irvine

Corn Dollies ‘Corn dollies, made from the last sheaf of corn, go back thousands of years.‘ Dressed in Edwardian attire, complete with straw boater I was attending a Mayday celebration. I watched a man working straw into intricate designs. He smiled, ‘I know just what your hat needs.’ Taking a long piece of straw, heads intact, […]

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Chinese Autumn by Mary Irvine

‘Ancient Chinese philosophy says humans should live in harmony with the natural cycles of their environment.’ A preparation for winter, a time to reflect and organize your life, a time to pay attention to the lungs and large intestine, for they deal with the process of purification and elimination. The lungs take in oxygen. We […]

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The Last Leaf – a poem for Autumn by Catriona Malan

Read the full article: The Last Leaf – a poem for Autumn by Catriona Malan