Article

Some of Us Are Gone

None of us are gone. You may call us gone. You may moan. You may dash from the places where you would sit and you thought we wouldn’t find you. You mourn our loss, we know. You walk on the floorboards of the house as if you were alone, eyeing every corner. Your habits stay…

Fresh Water from the Sea

The woman was weeks away. Maybe even days away. The phone calls at first were difficult to understand. “You shouldn’t worry about this, but I’m getting thinner,” she said to her daughter, but instead of the note of excitement the girl expected, the woman sounded lost. “There’s less of me.” The girl imagined an old…

Eleven Stories

Translated from the Arabic by the author and C. J. Collins Peace Agreement Strong and Weak signed a peace agreement; Weak had the document framed in a gold frame and hung it in the front room of his house. He called a press conference to publicize the event with photographs and articles. He considered it…

Murmuration

The bones of a daytime moon then the shock of them across it: using their arms like wings, wheeling above Middleton Moor now as one body, now as many. They fly in wax jackets and blue check shirts, plaid jumpers and high vis, magpie-black leather. Sometimes you might catch a bracelet falling like a feather,…

foghar eile / another autumn

original Gaelic poem with English translation by the author mo chasan a’ leughadh leabhar-cumha ruadh an fhoghair my feet reading the russet elegy-book of autumn eòlas nan dùil sgrìobhte ann an làmh rèimeil nan tùs ag innse dhomh gu’n d’fhiach an sgeul ath-aithris, nach eil anns an lobhadh     ach bruadar  knowledge of hopes written in…

Bóithre / Chaos Theory

original Irish poem with English translation by the author faiteadh súile feithide i bhforaois fearthainne i mBorneó the blink of an insect’s eye in the rain forest of Borneo chuir gála gaoithe ag réabadh na tíre, ag pleancadh scioból tuí set gale force winds ripping the country, battering tin sheds is monarchan iata, scoileanna réamhdhéanta…

Introduction

While it is only possible for this Ploughshares transatlantic issue to offer a snapshot of current British and Irish poetry, I have tried to make it as representative as possible. Most of the poets I’ve been able to solicit work from are included in one or other of the three most recent generational anthologies published…