Welcome to my third July Showcase.

Thinking more laterally about reflecting upon things this week, I realise it’s become a habit that is part and parcel of growth. It means spending time with yourself – your thoughts, motivations, dreams, past actions. In reflection, we make space for inquiry, and quite often this questioning becomes our compass when certainty runs dry. In reflection, we celebrate our successes, navigate our difficulties and even begin to ease sadness. In this spirit, we may pause, look inward and find meaning in the act of simply listening to the self.

This week, we start with a piece by Lisa Scully-O’Grady. I was struck by how Lisa transforms her quiet devastation of environmental loss into a call to love. Love is overcoming, dignified and grounded; her personal memories ultimately redeemed by a belief that love can still conquer all. In listening to the whispers of your heart, the answer will come.

The Call Of The Wild And Ancient

Before the wig and the dress coat
there were rivers, arterial rivers:
there were cordilleras, jagged waves where
the condor and the snow seemed immutable:
there was dampness and dense growth, the thunder
as yet unnamed, the planetary pampas.
— Pablo Neruda, Amor America (1400) from Canto General, trans. Jack Schmitt.

I write this now overlooking the steely blue-green ocean. It seems fitting: I was born on an island, surrounded by sea and mountains, rivers and lakes. Despite having lived in towns and cities –and on the continent –for much of my life, including a large part of my later childhood, in quiet moments of reflection I feel the call of the wild taking me home to myself. But just as you can never step into the same river twice, nature and our lives are always changing.

For two glorious summers of my childhood, I swam at the bend in a river where its banks formed a pebbled beach: shallow at first, then gradually deepening, though never too deep and with a gentle current at that particular spot. One early morning we even glimpsed a kingfisher; a shy bird, blink and you’d miss it.

My mother had always warned me against river swimming, wary of unpredictable currents and the unknown undergrowth; the danger of invisibility in river water, especially for children.

I was used to the salty sea or the chlorinated swimming pool, where I’d had lessons, though I quit as soon as I thought I could swim, because the teacher had been unkind to our friend who feared the water. As a result, I wasn’t a strong swimmer.

Some of the older local children convinced us to join them, claiming they knew the perfect place to enjoy the fabulous weather. They said they’d been given the landowner’s permission to go there. Perhaps some of their parents had passed down the secrets of the river.

It was my first time bathing in a river and it was glorious, so calm and peaceful. To my surprise, the current was barely noticeable. River reeds curled around my toes, their effervescent green glistening in the sunshine and I felt like a river nymph. Further out, where the water deepened and darkened, I became a water warrior, proudly practising my new swimming skills.

Although I’ve never swum in a river since, the memory of those summers remains. Those carefree days of childhood don’t return, no matter how much we wish they would. It was an early lesson in living in the now and treasuring people and experiences whilst they happen, not yearning to be elsewhere.

A few years later, no child would ever swim again in that river as we had; the entire waterway transformed in the name of progress and its natural floodplains and meandering path destroyed by a drainage scheme that forever altered the landscape. I’ll never forget the shock and devastation I felt when my father took me to see the ‘progress.’ We looked at each other in quiet sadness.

Up the road, my aunt and uncle’s farm had a Ráth and a spring well just below the hill. The area was dotted with Ráths and wells. Places you could drink clear, cool water after a hard day’s work or, in my case, play. A few years later, it, too, was contaminated by drainage work on neighbouring farms further up the hill.

There was even a story my aunt told me: how, back in the 1950s or 60s, the county council asked my grandparents to sell land for a new road. When they refused, the council eventually issued a compulsory purchase order.

Yet for several years, no workers touched the land. They were superstitious about disturbing the fairy fort said to bring bad luck. State-sponsored archaeological vandalism, some might say.

Even as a child, I felt this loss of the land’s simplicity and beauty, though it wasn’t something I could articulate. I never questioned my connection to nature, I simply embodied it. I was part of it, and it was part of me. Deep, ancient, visceral.

This was before climate change entered the conversation, before cars were questioned as symbols of progress. Officials had even proposed shutting down the railway line: “No future,” they’d said. Thankfully, that never came to pass.

But we needn’t quietly grieve the loss of our connection to the natural world. It’s not too late to save ourselves and our beautiful blue planet, our small dot in the universe. Ultimately, it all comes down to love. Love is the only thing that can save us now. With a shift in mindset, change can come easily. One person at a time, transformation ripples outward – an avalanche of change reaching a tipping point, where love will win.

Just be love. And when you falter, as you will, ask yourself: ‘What would love do?’

Stay silent.

Listen to the whispers of your heart.

The answer will come.

The rivers and the mountains, the land and the sea: they are singing me home. I am coming full circle. It’s not too late to be free.

(c) Lisa Scully-O’Grady, 2025

Connect with Lisa on Instagram: @letters_home_again and BlueSky: @lisaso.bsky.social

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I chose this next poem because the speaker’s resilience and acceptance in the face of life’s uncertainties resonated with me. It offers mature thoughtful reflection on ageing, memory and mortality, where turmoil has been weathered rather than exposed. It balances humour with honesty, capturing their inner state with grace, making it a powerful and quietly moving meditation on existence.

A Reckoning

Now I’ve passed three score and ten, my thoughts turn to my death.
Not because of foresight though, this isn’t my last breath.
It seems a perfect time to pause and maybe just take stock,
To look and see how far I’ve come; I might get quite a shock.
I’ve laughed and cried, I’ve loved and lost, I’ve seen some wondrous sights,
Of course I’ve made mistakes as well, I’ve had some sleepless nights.
But one thing is above all else, I’ve never ceased to learn,
every day another fact, some snippet I discern.
It’s stored away for future use, somewhere in my brain,
until the day that it’s required. Now what’s that name again?
On looking back, it’s plain to see life’s path has had its bumps.
I’ve been knocked down, got up again, most times I’ve come up trumps.
And now I will look forward to the decades yet to come,
marching forward, head held high, beating my own drum.
Taking on the world at large with courage and respect,
until the time when I must rest, my health I won’t neglect.
Then, and only then, I’ll stop, and if I’ve made my mark
I’ll be remembered, and if not, my light will just be dark.

© Ray Miles, 2025 

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Next, I chose Last Train by Jean Akintoye as its strangely dark theme captivated me. The poem portrays inner turmoil, setting up an atmosphere of surreal otherworldliness. It is both unsettling and strangely reflective; a confrontation with a soul who has all but given up.

Last Train
For Trevor Sellers

I don’t quite know how long I’ve waited here.
How long I’ve slumped upon this bench.
No back for support.
The seat subsumed with rust,
Flavourless and crisp,
Crumbling fangs sinking into what little soul they can salvage.
Too much water,
Too much air,
Too little light.
Great grey clouds hang above my eyes,
Like black iron battleships,
Or some faceless fish from the maw of Iblis,
With leather for skin
And Claymores for fins.

With no eyes, they shed no tears for me
So no rain to help me see.
But a glacial wind swoops upon my shoulders
Like a hell-bird’s talons
Or a decrepit angel’s solitary wing,
Shaking me awake,
And reminding me why I’m here.
A black ocean mires the station.
Opaque and unknowable as shadow-kissed lead,
The water’s edge caressing,
Stroking,
Eroding.
So it hangs on for dear life,
A last remaining arm,
Melded of plastic and steel
Supporting a sign, lights flickering, vanishing.
Cordially reminding me,
That the “Last Train to the Primrose Way” will arrive in five minutes.

Five minutes.
Five… minutes?
Hah.
There’s something funny about that.

I laugh.

A man approaches.
At least I think that’s what he was.
His arms folded behind his back,
In a bastardisation of some ancient uniform.
His face unseeable, but I suspect mangled.
I don’t see his mouth, but I hear him say
“Your ticket, please.”

My eyes widen.
I tell him no. I’ve got no ticket to show.
He repeats himself.
And I repeat, no. I’ve nothing to give him.
Nothing to declare.
Nothing to prove.
Nothing.

But I’m lying, of course.
And he knows this.
He knocks me to the floor.
He pins me with one hand.
He won’t say it a third time.
I want to fight back.
I want to scream; I want to shout.
I want to rip his hair, kick his jaw in, spit in his eyes, shatter his nose, scatter his teeth-

But I only watch in horror as his hand dives into my pocket
As an orca to its prey,
And pulls out a shred of card with illegible text.
He laughs,
I think,
And tries to look me in the eye as I avoid his gaze,
As the next train, the last train,
Its journey all but finished,
Pulls up at the platform, billowing silver smog and
pungent steam.
The man cackling,
The water whispering,
The doors opening.

(c) Jean Akintoye, 2025 

Connect with Jean on Instagram: @arbitrary_human

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Finally we have a poem from poet and writer, Madeleine F White. Just For Today courageously explores the raw vulnerability of fear and loss. Through intimate moments of connection and self-reflection, the emptiness left by change is confronted. Yet strength in love, purpose and inner truth is found. It offers a powerful reminder that, even amid uncertainty and fear, choosing to fully embrace the present moment can spark renewal and healing.

Just For Today

Today I’m very frightened
I’m full of fear today,
the things I thought defined me
have upped and gone away.
Redundancy has left a hole
gaping in my Soul
and all the things I thought made me
are not what make me whole.

A Title, a Name, a Game
a Job, a Chair and Blame
I know a salary does not equal me
but what does?

Is it the knowing I must find out
what my life’s all about
making me frightened?

No Comfort Cushion, Emails, Fake Smiles
to derail or defocus
just me.
So, how will I be?

Today I will write of the moon and the stars
And the smell of my daughter’s hair
as I prepare her for her school trip.

Today I will enjoy seeing love renewed in my husband’s eyes
as he looks at me, reassuring me it’s all alright,
it’s just a blip, I’ll find something soon.

Today I will start on a frame-work
wrought from the love and hope that defines who I am.
I will listen to the deep, throbbing sound of the drums of Your will
that tell me I can.

So, just for today I shall:
share the Thought that compels
the Truth that cuts through
the Beauty that shines
and the good that is You.

Today I’m very frightened,
but I am not Afraid.

(c) Madeleine F White, 2025

Connect with Madeleine on X and Instagram: @madeleinefwhite

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Connect with Julie on her website: juliedexterwriter.com, Facebook: @julieadexter, Instagram: @latenightswimmer, Bluesky: @juliedexterwriter and X: @julieadexter

If you’d like to see your writing appear in the Write On! Showcase, please submit your short stories, poetry or novel extracts to: pentoprint.org/get-involved/submit-to-write-on/

Hear extracts from Showcase in our podcast. Write On! Audio. Find us on all major podcast platforms, including Apple and Google Podcasts and Spotify. Type Pen to Print into your browser and look for our logo or find us on Spotify for Pocasters.

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