A poem by my friend Linda Ann Fraser

Fear Marbh

Off the coast of the Dingle Peninsula of Ireland

A man shaped rock island lies, 

Inis Tuaisceart, the Northern Isle.

They call him Fear Marbh, the deadman.

How does a heart and soul of a man turn to stone?

He’s been in this same spot for as long as time

and man have been around to witness him.

A man who can’t see beyond his rocky bed, 

cannot recognize emotions in himself or

others, he never changes, even when storms

pass by with waves that break over him.

He does not yield, he is deaf to all that

call just like when he was a human?

Is this why his unfeeling heart has 

turned to stone?

If a spark of truth should penetrate

this rock, will warmth and compassion ignite?

How many waves have pounded his side?

The cries of humanity may some day leak

through as the world circles the sun

in our vast luminous universe.

Linda Ann Fraser

1/16/2026

Inis Tuaisceart (In-is Tōōsh-kart)

Fear Marbh (Fear Mar-ov)

Love Song of Pluto and Charon

Here's a love poem I wrote a few years ago:

What can they know of you

or me? They talk as if you were

 

my concubine, following my orbit

with head bowed, three steps behind.

 

No one imagines how we carry

each other’s soul across the river

 

of the divided universe. My blush

is well documented, but not the pleasure

 

we take bathing in the milk of our mutual

banishment. Is our bond science

 

or fiction? Their calculations prove

convergence is impossible. Yet

 

our ice shields are lit with pulses that spike

without ever touching. When I laugh, you

 

feel the breath of snow drops blooming

in the frost, and your tears are butterflies

 

that land on my open palms. Some believe

deities watch and nod approvingly. But

 

from where? Look, even the radiant eye

of Jupiter is blind, a shrinking swirl of salt.

 

There is no above or below in infinity – we both

know hierarchy is a mortal’s dream chased

 

by the tiger claws of uncertainty. And so we float

in our mingled dust, embracing the solar wind

 

and cerulean glow no one sees but us.

published in The Poeming Pigeon: Cosmos, 2020, The Poetry Box

Child's play

Playing with words and colors like a kid with finger paint, not too worried about making sense.

Look

     the lake is lit

                amazing

we have come

            wild and light

                               unpetalled

                                            love

float and sail

                                        astonished

                                                                 impossible

                                                                       excess

                                                           

When Words Fail

 

Don't Cry Over Spilled Water

I spilled a glass of water on my desk, and my notebook, open-mouthed, drank from it until the swollen pages stuck. Tenderly peeling each page apart, I fanned them with my thumb throughout the day and later bore the book upstairs and aimed the hot breath of the blue blow dryer on it.

I thought I preferred those first pristine pages, remembering how, eyes closed, my pen could glide precisely as shining blades on ice. But now there are crags to climb -- the buckled paper contains lakes of stains to cross. To write here is to tread deep into Hansel and Gretel's dark forest. To dance with a bear, the scent of blood and blackberries on its breath, to palm the warm apricots and plums bartered for at Christina's Goblin Market, to put them in my mouth, between teeth and tongue, then face the flowering of fangs and stars. 

A poem for the end of the year

I want to burn 

some of this year

to nothing,

but ash,

like snow,

falls to the ground

where we will

walk again.

And smoke? We

breathe it in,

and, dragonlike,

exhale flames

that torch

crows and crops

alike.

Be careful 

what you burn,

I tell myself today,

stir the embers gently,

as if they were a soup 

you would spoon

into every mouth.

Before the Sun Knows You're Awake

 

Carol Weliky -- writer, friend and human extraordinaire -- has a new chapbook, Before the Sun Knows You're Awake, available from Dancing Girl Press & Studio.

Part family mystery, part wrestling match with a sudden and new identity, Before the Sun Know You’re Awake is an unflinchingly honest tour de force. On a lark, Weliky took a DNA test -- a whim that caused the earth to roll and crack beneath her feet as the results revealed that her sister is really her half-sister, the man she believed to be her father was not her father at all, and her DNA stretched back to a place she couldn't have imagined. Evoking One Thousand and One Nights and other folktales, Weliky’s poetic prose enthralls as she searches for the truth at the heart of this mystery: herself.

Weliky is a writer and artist who enjoys exploring genres. Sometimes she writes songs. Several of her poems, short fictions, and a personal essay have been published in small presses and a short play was produced and performed for Portland, Oregon's Fertile Ground Festival. A poetic line of hers is stamped in concrete on one of Portland's light-rail stations. She is currently working on a book of short-form poetry. Before the Sun Knows You’re Awake is her first chapbook.

You can order a copy of Before the Sun Knows You're Awake here.