From above, a drop, brief as a comma, spaced from the next by a breath of time not cold, not wet, a touch on the wrist and a sound – tick – or not quite
Marking my territoryMarking my territory
Some decades ago, an ethologist, Robert Ardrey, gained much exposure with the idea of the “territorial imperative”. His study of animal behaviour led him to the conclusion that the strongest drive in the beast was
The final laughThe final laugh
Over the two decades when I marked the final examinations for Matriculation, major changes occurred. In the early years, I was able to port home large bundles of unmarked scripts which I would even pull
I break the silenceI break the silence
It has been close to thirty years since I watched the film The Silence of the Lambs. It is a day I shall never forget. What led to it was a sequence of events, beginning
My unknown antagonistMy unknown antagonist
Some people I know, when relating their or their family’s medical problems describe them as being very rare, something seldom found in the textbooks, a rather special case. Having observed how much better they are
SeedbankSeedbank
At the window the blank of a dayedges up from an unseen horizon.A sudden tang of air shoulders space awayopens a door to a place long forgotten where scent seeded the rich red soil burnt
The things I didn’t doThe things I didn’t do
When I was ten years old my mother and father travelled overseas for a month and left my older sister, brother and me in the care of a lady who, being what seemed a great
The names we areThe names we are
You bear a name from birth, not to distinguish you from the 9,579 other Donovans but to identify you as a person whom can be addressed and, unless one of those other 9,579 other Donovans
Two poemsTwo poems
A moment of unknowing I find my way to the bedand slowly nest myself between the sheetscareful not to awaken her sleep.Perhaps she dreams far from mewith people and places known and unknown surfacing from
A salutary lessonA salutary lesson
At school we had a resident cynic. “One thing I’ll never be is a dentist- imagine looking into people’s mouths all day.” was the least cynical statement I remember him making – he had a