In Purgs

By Andy Hamilton

The blind man hurls a lopsided stone into the lake, unsettling the one legged heron in the grey shallows. Beside him on the wooden mooring, the man-on-the-street sits cross-legged, head bowed, enveloped by his dark trench coat.

            “There’s rain coming,” says the blind man, in a salivating monotone. He takes a second stone from his trouser pocket and examines it forensically between his worn fingertips. “I said… rain coming.” He swings his arm wildly, the stone spiraling carelessly onto an upturned log before finding the water with an unsatisfactory plop. “You’d best put on your cap. There’s a rain coming. I can see it.”

            “You can see it?” spits the man-on-the-street. “You?”

            “I can see the light changing. And I feel the warmth going from the air.”

            “Ha,” says the man-on-the-street. “You have no eyes to see and no sense to understand. Look, I’m already wearing my cap. See?”

            The blind man turn away from the man-on-the-street. “I can see no cap,” he says in a hushed voice. “I am blind.”

The blind man sits on the edge of the mooring, dangling his naked feet just above the grasp of the dark waters. He takes a small notebook from his coat, scribbles on a page, and returns it quickly to his pocket. Crawling on all four, the man-on-the-street scuttles behind him, breathing heavily.

            “What did you write?” he asks, wafting wet air into the blind man’s ear.

            “Nothing. Nothing at all, just marking the time.”

            “Lie to me again and I’ll slit your throat,” growls the man-on-the-street.

            “I didn’t. I wont. I’m just marking the day and time. It’s evidence.”

            “Evidence? Evidence of what?”

            “Evidence that we are here. It’s a record, a document to mark our suffering.”

            “You’re a fool,” says the man-on-the-street. He slaps the blind man around the back of the head.

            “I just want justice. That’s all.”

            “Justice! Ha! There is no justice in Purgs. Not unless you’re ready to kill for it or to die for it. Are you ready to die?”

            The blind mind shakes his head and moves from the edge of the water.

The blind man kneels in the centre of the mooring, scratching at the wooden boards with a small rock. Fresh darkness has invaded from the lake. The man-on-the-street lies flat on his back, his eyes searching for companions in the new forming stars.

            “We could start a fire?” offers the blind man, his head rising from his labour.

            “The wood is too wet. It will not burn.”

            “What if we had matches and some petrol?”

            “That would help, certainly. Do you have matches and some petrol?”

            “No.”

            “Nor do I.”

            “Right. What will we do then?”

            “We will scrape with the rock,” snaps the man-on-the-street.

            The blind man returns to his work, swinging the rock in large, un-aimed spirals. He stops. “What will happen when we finish?”

            “Finish?”

            “When the scraping is done?

            “When the scraping is done, then we’ll be free.”

            “Free,” says the blind man. He elongates the word, allowing each letter to ring out in the heavy evening mist. “Free.” He gets to his feet. “But when the wood is gone, what will keep us dry?”

            “We will be free,” says the man-on-the-street.

The blind man huddles in the centre of the mooring. Great slabs of rain fall all about him as his rocks back and forth.

            “What’s the matter, dolt,” shouts the man-on-the-street.

            “I’m… I’m afraid of the dark,” says the blind man.

            “But you’re blind? It’s darkness all the time for you.”

            “I know,” cries the blind man. He begins to weep.

            “Stop it!” shouts the man-on-the-street, slapping him about the face and neck. “Stop it, stop it now.” He punches him hard in the kidneys.

              “Oooh,” says the blind man, all the air leaving his body.

            “See what I did,” says the man-on-the-street. “See what I did for you.”

            “I’m dying,” says the blind man, gasping for air.

The blind man stands on a wooden ladder on the edge of the mooring. He holds his hand in a half solute above his eyebrows, shielding his face from the rising sun.

            “What do you see now, blind man,” mocks the man-on-the-street.

            “I can see water. Nothing but cold, dark water.”

            “Humm,” says the man-on-the-street. “You know, four people once managed all the water on this lake. Four people, and I knew all of them.”

            “You knew them. But then maybe they could help, maybe there’s a way.”

            “There is no way,” snaps the man-on-the-street. “Unless you’re ready to kill or to die.”

            “You’re right. I’m sorry,” says the blind man. “I forgot myself. I’ve been…” He descends the ladder slowly, heavy feet labouring over each wet step. The blind man flops on to the mooring, his hands clasped on either side of his head. “How long have we been here?” he asks. “How long have we been in Purgs?”

            The man-on-the-street does not answer.

           

The blind man stands in the centre of the wooden mooring. Hands on his hips, he breathes in great gulps of fresh, cold air. In the shallows below, the heron has returned to its nest.

-ENDS-

Nasturtium

By Andy Hamilton 

He walks to the window slowly, dragging polished shoes across the cold tile floor.

         “It’s been so…” he offers, working the blinds with his knotted fingers, “unexpected. More like April than November really. Not a bad day for it, as days go.”

         A shaft of white light enters the room.

         “You’d enjoy the Nasturtiums this year,” he says, shielding his eyes against the sunshine. “They’ve been sending out waves of new buds. It’s like they haven’t realised it’s winter. They’re fierce this year, or foolish. I can’t tell. But you’d like them.”

         He turns slowly, opens his mouth and closes it again.

         “Mary won’t be coming,” he blurts. “She can’t. She’s so busy and I think she’s… well, you know how busy she is. You understand, I’ll tell her you understand.”

         With slow, deliberate footsteps he walks to the bedside. Creaking, he bends and kisses her on the forehead and then, after a moments, on the lips.

         “I miss you,” he whispers.

         He rights himself and pauses thoughtfully before making his way to the door. A thin smile forms on his lips.

         “You would have loved those nasturtiums.”

Short story to be published in new book by O'Brien's Press

Evening all, One of my short stories (a very, very short story) has been chosen, via a competition on RTE Radio 1's Book Show, to be published in a new book of very, very short stories by O'Brien's Press. The story is about 180 words (see what I mean), is called Nasturtiums and is about loss and learning how to let go. It's the first short story I've finished in the past year, as I've been slogging my way through the last few chapters of the blinking novel, so I'm very happy that's it been included. A number of the chosen stories (maybe mine, maybe not) will be featured in tomorrow night's live broadcast of the Book Show of RTE Radio, which is coming live from the book launch at Twisted Peppers in Dublin from 7.30pm to 8.30pm. The book itself is a limited edition, so I'm not sure how you, or indeed me, might go about getting a copy. But when I know, you'll know.
Cheers,
Andy

Times are a changing...

Hello folks, I've just started work on Chapter 26 of the novel (that's the second last chapter for anyone who is counting) so I should be in a position to get back to some good old fashioned short story writing once the first draft is finished. So let's say December. Fingers crossed.
Also, I've decided that I'm just going to have change the name of this blog and the facebook page. Fighting Talk is way too similar to Fighting Words, that's the brilliant creative writing for kids group founded by Roddy Doyle. Every time a hear Fighting Words mentioned on the radio, I sort-of cringe at the similarity and feel like I just plain stole the name - even though I didn't. So, the old name is dead, long live the new name. Whatever name that ends up being.
I'm currently kicking around a few name ideas -  I want something catchy but not verbose, explanatory but also gritty and 'real'. So, if anyone has any brilliant ideas, please, for goodness sake, bring them.
Cheers
Andy

In conversation with... Donal Ryan

Earlier this year I spoke with Donal Ryan, the young Tipperary writer whose debut novel 'The Spinning Heart' is one of the best Irish releases of the past 18 months. The interview, which was first published in April of this year, is a great tonic for any young or frustrated writer. Donal speak openly about his constant struggle for confidence and explains how sometimes he has to "pretend to be somebody else, just to get to the end of the paragraph.  

One of the first things that strikes a readers about the work of Donal Ryan is the simple confidence of his prose. The language is direct and unforgiving, flowing easily from a page that appears to have been crafted by the character itself, and not during late night labours over a script. But Ryan, like so many of us, struggles desperately with his confidence.
If anything though, the knowledge of this battle make the Tipperary author more appealing. The details of his personal struggle somehow manage to give even more weight to the work that he produces.
“It took me 20 years to get a level of confidence in my own ability to actually send something that I had written out into the world. A breakdown in confidence assails me all the time, pretty much every day. Sometimes half way through a sentence. A sentence might start well and then I would struggle half way through to close it. It would break down on me. I think it is something that you constantly have to fight with. Everyone is the same, no one is perfectly confident. You have to work at it. Sometime I have to try and be somebody else. Sometimes I have to pretend to be somebody else just so I can get to the end of a paragraph,” said Donal.

To read this interview in full of previous interviews with Julian Gough, Colm Toibin and Kevin Barry, lick HERE

And another thing...

So to begin at the start, apologies for the long gap since the last blog post. The last few months have been busy but Georgina, the novel that is, continues apace. I'm currently writing my way through Chapter 25, which should have me on target to complete a full first draft by October of this year.
That should, with any bit of luck, free me to complete some of the scores of short stories which have been kicking around my notebook for the past 18 months, looking for a home. I'm particularly excited about one story, set in an rural Irish mart, which has been prodded into life, if not entirely inspired, by the short stories of Leonard Michaels. The image accompanying this post was taken by my friend Margaret Cahill, herself a budding young Irish writer. The image, taken in a County Kerry ghost estate, could easily form the backdrop to the action in Georgina. Thanks to Margaret for that.

Cheers,
Andy

Blow It Open. Seamus Heaney and the black lake of the Burren

The swans may be gone, but Seamus Heaney still has the power to catch the heart and blow it open. Writes Andy Hamilton.

Sometimes art and nature seem to melt together. It happened in 'Postscript', Seamus Heaney's love-letter to the Flaggy Shore and the North Clare Burren. And, in a strange reversal of symmetries, it seems to be happened again.

Months after the death of the Nobel laureate, the land so beloved by Heaney still appears to be in mourning. Since the turn of the year, things have not be right in Lough Marree, the freshwater lake on the Flaggy Shore.
The lake, located a dozen or so feet from the saline waters of Galway Bay and the Atlantic Ocean, has slowly been turning black. This gradual darkening of the lake came to a dramatic climax earlier this month when the lakes large flocks of whooper and mute swans, the same birds immortalised by Heaney in Postscript, abandoned the lake.
This, understandably, took the locals by shock, especially the members of the excellent blog A Flaggy Shore Miscellany. The blackening of the lake and departure of Heaney's swam had more than a vibe of mourning about it - it seemed to encapsulate the feeling of so many who lived and loved to the rhythm of Heaney's pen.
It would seem, however, that nature has an explanation, even though the romantics amongst may us wish it hadn't. The storms force gales which battered the Clare coast in January and February, would seem to deposited a massive amount of seaweed into lake.
Trapped in the lake, this seaweed has been slowly breaking down in the fresh water for past three months, pickling the water and slowly turning in black.
There is some sentiment left in the story however, and according to John Murphy of Clare Birdwatching, the flocks of whooper and mute swans should return to the lake this Autumn, just in time for the year anniversary of Seamus Heaney's death.