The sky is dark with fear
with the moon a yellow parachute
making shadows long.
Salena is with her two children in the bathroom
before bedtime. Badriya and Amin wash their face,
then the car bomb goes off.
Salena runs, squeezing their hands.
Her shoes stick in the mud
then she abandons them.
Reaching a border post, they are refused entry
since they lack paperwork.
Salena gives the guard an unspoken favour.
She tells Badriya and Amin about the dream tree.
It sways its branches when you sing to it
and it makes your dreams come true.
The moon shines over the campsite,
a forest of yellow plastic sheets.
They stand with a sheet between
touching the outline of their faces.
(Published in The Blue Nib, issue 38, June 2019)
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Published by diarmuidfitzgerald
I am a poetry and prose writer. I write poetry, haiku, haibun, short stories as well as novels. Two haiku collections have been published by Alba Publishing (www.albapublising.com). Thames Way appeared in 2015 and A Thousand Sparks in 2018. Poems have appeared in The Stinging Fly, Cyphers, Boyne Berries, The Blue Nib, Flare, Impossible Archetype, and Crannóg. A poem of mine won 2nd place in the Ballyroan Library Competition 2018 and again in 2020. I won the Individual Artist Bursary from South Dublin County Council 2018. I won a scholarship to attend the Yeats Summer School 2018 in Sligo. Sixteen poems of mine were Highly Commended in the Blue Nib Chapbook Contests IV and V in 2019. A poem was shortlisted in the Bray Literary Festival in 2018. A poem was long-listed in Over The Edge Poetry Competition 2019. A haibun received an honourable mention in the Genjuan Haibun Competition 2021. The Singing Hollow, my first collection of poems, has been accepted for publication by Alba Publishing.
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Diarmuid Fitzgerald 