Words to Tie to Bricks Read online

  First published in 2013 by

  CTYI Press

  Centre for Talented Youth Ireland, Dublin City University, Dublin 9

  All rights © 2013 Centre for Talented Youth Ireland

  Paperback

  eBook – mobi format

  eBook – ePub format

  CreateSpace edition

  ISBN: 978 1 909483 385

  ISBN: 978 1 909483 392

  ISBN: 978 1 909483 408

  ISBN: 978 1 909483 415

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or utilised in any form or by any means electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, filming, recording, video recording, photography, or by any information storage and retrieval system, nor shall by way of trade or otherwise be lent, resold or otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published without prior permission in writing from the publisher.

  The right of each contributor to be identified as the author of his or her work has been asserted by him or her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  All characters and events featured in this publication, other than those clearly in the public domain, are entirely fictitious and any resemblance to any person living or dead, organisation or event, is purely coincidental. Any mistakes are the author’s own.

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  Cover design by Andrew Brown

  Printed in the EU

  Contents

  Foreword

  Notes from the Authors

  Anthology of Writing 2013

  Heavy Heart

  I still remember how you take your coffee in the morning

  Success

  Even Now, Even Here, Beautiful

  A Summer’s Evening

  A Gentleman’s Guide To Playing With Your Food

  Flight

  A Broken Us

  Deep

  Home

  Yellow

  My End

  An Introduction To Me

  Silence

  Made of Glass

  I Did It

  Slammed Receiver

  Fading Spirit

  The Second

  With the Birds

  We Regret to Inform You, Madame

  Home

  Haiku

  To My Redo Button

  Off to the Right

  Dust on the Tracks

  Immortal Jellyfish

  Give It To Me Straight

  Check the Box

  On the Other Hand, Flowers

  Unrequited Love

  The Routine

  The Sense of a Meal

  Young Love (Sestina)

  Bygones

  You Are Now, Always Have Been, and Forever Will Be an

  Florabotanica

  Smile

  Cyborg

  Soaked To My Blood

  Frosty Windshields, Glass & Cellar Doors

  Run

  The Clichés Are Ready and Waiting

  Needles and Knives

  Entropy

  To Find a Name

  Those Temptations

  A Frozen Life

  She Said

  Damp Tissues

  Painting in the Dark

  Or Don’t

  The Shadows

  Beautiful Gas Mask

  Three Balanced Meals

  Little World of Faith

  Off-piste

  I thought wrong

  Glitter

  Filling the Void

  First Day

  The Trials of Miss Elisa

  Irrationality

  A Walk along the Brussels Road

  Just relax

  Mistaken

  Eve

  Even This Much Chocolate Couldn’t Make Us Sweet

  My Prison

  Heels against the Cobblestone An Interlude

  A Wet and Foggy Season

  Just let me sleep

  If I Left

  Notes on contributors

  Foreword

  WORKING AS THE DIRECTOR OF an organisation that celebrates the potential of high-ability students can be a humbling experience when I realise that there are teenagers, and quite often also younger children, who are in many ways smarter than I will ever be. The book that you are reading now further reinforces this opinion.

  CTY Ireland is a place where young people who excel in different academic and creative areas get a chance to meet other students of similar ability and hopefully share some common ground. The outcome of this programme regularly exceeds our highest expectations. The work produced is of the highest standard as students get a chance to work at their own pace and engage fully with subjects that are of interest to them. Socially, friendships are made and these can often be lifelong connections.

  It has been my privilege to work for this organisation for the past 20 years (yes, that is older than the eldest of the contributors to this book) and over 50,000 students have passed through the doors of CTY Ireland in that period. One of the main goals of the organisation is to challenge academically talented students at a level appropriate to their ability rather than their age. This book allows us to turn this potential into something real.

  I’m delighted that any profits from this book will go to St Michael’s House that does such great work with people who have intellectual disabilities. With the headquarters across the road from us here at Dublin City University it seems the perfect fit for this book.

  Finally I would like to congratulate all the contributors to this book, our fantastic CTY Ireland students and in particular a great former student, the teacher Claire Hennessy. Claire, your dedication to this project makes it worth at least a shortlist for the Booker prize.

  Enjoy the book.

  Colm O’Reilly

  Director

  CTY Ireland

  Notes from the Authors

  To the unprepared reader – We promise there are explanations. We’re just not including them, and you should probably be grateful.

  To the prepared reader – Please refer to the previous point. You cannot possibly be prepared.

  To the parents – Look at what you’ve released upon the world. Also, we don’t need counselling, in case you were wondering.

  To the siblings – I’m in a book. Take that. Also: All the mean bits are inspired by you. Congratulations.

  To the friends – I hope you remain so after you read that one piece. You know the one.

  To the pets – Good money was probably spent on this book. Stop eating it.

  To the acquaintances – This is probably more than you wanted to know.

  To the teachers – I told you I was special.

  To the haters – Don’t hate the poet, hate the poem.

  To our sworn enemies, the philosophy students – We have a book, you don’t exist. Who’s the winner here?

  To the romantic partners – We swear this is not about you. Unless you want it to be. In which case, it totally is. XOXO

  To the ex-romantic partners – This is all about you. Unless you want it to be, in which case it isn’t.

  To the future romantic partners – This isn’t as bad as it looks. By the way, if you find a poem tied to a brick and a broken window in your front room, don’t be alarmed. It’s a sign of affection, we swear.

  To our fellow pathetic writers-to-be – Look ho
w much you can do. Keep your chin up. We’re all terrible together. Also, group therapy could be fun.

  To the CTYI staff – Thanks for taking a chance on us. We hope you’re not crying.

  To the world – Whoops. Our bad.

  Lots of love, Anthology of Writing Class 2013

  xoxox

  Anthology of Writing 2013

  LIST OF CONTRIBUTORS

  Catherine Bowen

  Amy Campbell

  Sean Ceroni

  Grace Collins

  Samuel H. Doyle

  Andrew Duffy

  Caelen Feller

  Conor Kelleher

  Hannah-Rose Manning

  Carol McGill

  Orla McGovern

  Anna Mulligan

  Hannah O’Boyle

  Emma Shevlin

  Cahal Sweeney

  Instructor: Claire Hennessy

  Teaching assistant: Emily Collins

  Heavy Heart

  EMMA SHEVLIN

  I’m writing this to show you

  I’m writing this to say

  That what I feel inside me,

  It just won’t go away.

  I find it weighs me down,

  It burns just like a fire.

  The mass of my emotions,

  The density of my desire.

  I’ve found a way to let you know

  How much I love you, dear.

  Forget the window,

  Treasure the brick,

  That you find lying here.

  I still remember how you take your coffee in the morning

  HANNAH O’BOYLE

  There are still crumbs on the desk

  from that cake you bought me

  when my favourite uncle died

  and I was barely eating.

  The carpet is still worn

  from the time you tried

  to teach me how to dance,

  and I stepped on your toes.

  The petals have fallen

  from the flowers you gave

  the last time you smiled at me.

  I guess that means something.

  I still have your pillow.

  I hope you don’t mind.

  (I’m sorry.)

  (Come back.)

  Success

  GRACE COLLINS

  I’VE NEVER BEEN SUCCESSFUL. But I have this idea of what it feels like.

  Imagine a world. A world where everything is possible. Anything you can dream is a reality, nightmares are a myth, pain an old wives’ tale. People don’t get old and die so no one is ever burdened with loss. Everyone knows this. They know that the idea of something not existing is the only thing that is impossible. And the consequence of everything is different from here. They are good consequences because bad actions cannot be done.

  And today, on this day, people feel something. They don’t know what, but they can feel something great in the air. It’s pumping throughout their bodies, each step bringing them one step closer to it. No one knows why though. They don’t question it but soon they will.

  And you, you are the exception to all of this. You know of things that aren’t real. You know that not everything you dream is real but you don’t care, not one bit. You know that consequences are not always good because bad actions will hurt. And you know that sometimes people die, and it hurts to lose them. You know that soon things will change in this world. And do you want to know what else you know? You know that you are the cause of this greatness and you know that soon, everyone will know this, but it will be too late.

  You see, you’re in this big old city. Hundreds of people all around. Buildings that mark the wonderful civilizations before cover the ground. You are standing on the top of the tallest, oldest building; you feel no fear, you feel no bravery. You feel nothing. You simply exist. And standing on this height you can see everyone and everything and you can see how they feel the unknown greatness. And if you focus a little bit, you can feel all their emotions, you can feel the happiness and the joy and you feel every emotion at once and you know all these things and you step to the edge of the building.

  And you turn your back on the city.

  You take a breath.

  And you do not jump. You let go.

  Such a simple thing to do and yet it has taken all this time. Suddenly you know that the people know and for the first time in your life you are doing something different.

  I imagine the feeling of success as not the feeling of hitting the ground, not of letting yourself drop but the feeling in between.

  The feeling of falling and the feeling of knowing and the feeling of feeling. And the feeling of doing more than just existing.

  That is success.

  Even Now, Even Here, Beautiful

  CONOR KELLEHER

  In a world where nothing is beautiful,

  And if it were, it would be obscured by the black

  And by the tint of your gas mask.

  The world had long begun to melt.

  The planet enveloped by a toxic fog.

  A life now not of colours, but of shapes

  And on a high hill, are our shifting shapes.

  We can’t remember anything bright or beautiful,

  And so we journey through the fog,

  To see if there’s anything to be seen that isn’t black.

  The liquid landscape around us is devoted to the melt.

  Or what I can see of it, anyway, through my mask.

  The gas means you cannot remove the mask,

  And so we’ve forgotten our faces’ shapes.

  I think of how little we know of each other, and I begin to melt.

  If I could see you, I know you would be beautiful.

  All we are outside, silhouettes against black.

  All we are inside, twisting fog.

  But maybe we should be thankful for that fog,

  And the limitations of the mask.

  Do we want to see what’s blocked by blankets of black?

  Do we want those defined shapes?

  Maybe the ignorance and blank bliss is beautiful.

  My eyes begin to melt.

  But we run, even as we melt.

  We will find our treasure in the fog,

  Even if that treasure is less than beautiful.

  Brand new scars mark my mask,

  A record of where we’ve been, and of the shapes

  Of what we’ve carved for ourselves from the black.

  There are whispers in the black,

  Fixed figures that live in the melt.

  We hide from their defined shapes.

  I love you, I promise, no matter what happens in this fog.

  I love you and I love your gas mask.

  It’s all fantastically beautiful.

  In the black, you slip through the fog.

  And the melt devours you through your mask.

  I see your gasping faces’ shapes. Even now, even here, beautiful.

  A Summer’s Evening

  CAROL MCGILL

  IT’S BEEN A SWELTERING DAY, moving slowly into an exhausting, hot night. It’s been a day when the sun softens the world with heat and paints everything with gold, a day when all there is to be done is lie in the shade fanning yourself with a napkin, a day to spend sucking at ice lollies or eating strawberries or twisting your hair in your hand so it doesn’t stick to the back of your neck.

  It’s at sunset on a day like this that you come home.

  Though it was a day for doing nothing, we did everything.

  I took the kids down to swim in the river. When we got back to the house, I let them run on the grass in the garden to dry off. For a while I chased them, laughing hysterically and tickling them, but then the heat got the better of me and I went inside. It was too hot to cook so I made a sort of salad for dinner. I watched through the window as the children chased each other, collapsed with fatigue, and chased once again.

  After I called them in we ate the makeshift salad with bread and butter. We drank lots of lemonade and ate
lots of ice cream. I took them on a walk to the meadow and told them to be very, very quiet and not to move at all, because then we’d see the rabbits. We wandered home through the dusk and they put on their pyjamas. Becky pulled her nightshirt over her head but then stripped off immediately because she was too hot, so I opened all the windows in their room and let them splash cold water on their faces. I told them a story. When I go back to check on them now they’re asleep, but the blankets are in a heap on the floor.

  Leaving the back door open, I go outside. It’s cooling down out here, despite getting stuffier in the house. The shadows are growing longer and the gold light is fading to give way to night. I walk down the garden and lean on the back gate, watching the sunset. And then I see you.

  You take your time coming up the lane that runs by the back of the house. You’re very close before I see your face and I know for sure that it’s you. Long before that I become very conscious of how faded the flowers are on the summer dress I’m wearing, of how tangled my hair is and how dirty the soles of my feet are, because it had been too hot for shoes all day. When I see that it’s you I feel dreamlike. Not that I think I’m asleep – I know it’s real and that’s what makes it a dream.

  When you finally reach me you stop so there’s nothing between us but that rusty gate. This was where you’d always kissed me goodnight. This was where the best kind of silence had always replaced the best kind of words. This was where you’d looked in my eyes and promised never to do what you’d done. This was where I’d waited for you every night, for all of the first year you were gone.

  Today, I wait for you to break the silence.

  But you don’t. You look past me, up the garden towards the house that was our home, with a sort of longing in your eyes.

  I wonder if you know about your lighter lying on my dressing table, and how I used it that one time I tried to smoke, after everyone claimed it’d help me relax. I wonder if you know about the way I kept buying your favourite tea bags for months. I wonder if you know how guilty I felt after I replaced those yellow curtains you picked out. If you know how I jumped down my sister’s throat when she sat in your chair on her visit. How I had to stop the clock because the ticking drove me mad. How much I cried after giving away your clothes. I wonder if you know how I broke all the china in the house after you were gone.