Being deprived of any sort of holiday this summer has made me ... well, kind of nostalgic. Dreamy. Yearning for a summer of long ago. A balmy, sexy summer back in communist Poland of the 1980s, deep in the heart of the Tatra mountains. And here’s the weird thing. It’s a summer I never even [...]
Is it something about the month of June? Is it the heat? The provocative birdsong? Is that why these wayward memories have been taking me down meandering lanes I haven’t trodden in years? So here’s one that’s been assailing me today. One from 25 years ago, when I was dizzily, crazily in love. Ah, those [...]
Believe it or not, I’d never heard of the term ‘dead bedrooms’ until just the other week, when I was having a chat with an old friend about the conundrum of marriage and what makes it so terminal. As soon as she mentioned the phrase dead bedrooms, something deep inside me all at once came [...]
And now, Mother, it’s your turn! Enter Molly Williams, heroine of all my life’s journeys, protagonist of my memoir! Imagine the scene. I have just stepped inside the large entrance hall of Belle View, our Victorian Bed & Breakfast home in Lyneham-on-Sea. I’ve dropped my bags and guitar case on the floor, and am bombarded [...]
I wrote this poem one Valentine's Day many, many years ago, when my heart was full of longing for a forbidden love. I never sent it to the man in question, because ... well, I just didn't. I couldn't. So here it is now, several decades late. Wonder if he'll finally read it? LOST LOVE [...]
EMPTINESS The snow is falling and I am falling with it. Softly, silently it falls. No sound as the flakes touch land. Just a vast, empty winter’s landscape, inside and out. Enough is enough. Let there be oblivion: an end to the live sparks of human emotion. Just the snow out there, softly falling, carrying [...]
Here's a not-your-average Christmas story. I should know. I was there. The crackling strains of Silent Night filled the room from the antiquated radio. It was a German recording of Silent Night, very close to the original score that had been composed by Franz Xavier Gruber in December 1818. ‘Could you turn it louder?’ I [...]
Wendy Skorupski 