Yorkshire Writers' Lunch

Once upon a time, there were seven dwarfs who lived happily together in their little cottage in the wood.   ‘Well, I don’t think it’s fair,’ snapped Cranky. ‘Our cousins’ve got one. I don’t see why we shouldn’t have one, too. We could lead a life of ease, like they do.’   ‘But what would we do with her, if we had one?’ asked Doleful.   ‘Oh, stop being so negative. She could do our washing and keep house. She’d be a better cook than Dumpy. He usually eats more than reaches the table.’   ‘But how can we get one, Cranky? Just how many mothers do you know who want to kill their daughters?’   Burpy asked, accompanying the question with a loud belch.   ‘Most of ‘em, at some point. We just have to catch them at the right moment.’ Awful answered.   ‘Oh, you are rotten, Awful,’ Weepy said. ‘Or just awfully rotten. Come on, time we were at work.’   The seven filed out, collecting their little picks on the way and singing their unhappy little song. After a hard day’s work, they filed home again,

  A writer is a jobbing journalist, a name-dropped novelist, a happy hobbyist. A writer is.   Writing is pen to paper, hunt-and-pecking, cut-and-sticking. Writing is.   A writer is a rhyming poet, a folktale teller, a script performer. A writer is.   Writing is getting it down, holding it close, letting it go. Writing is.   A writer is forward-planning, first-drafting, self-editing. A writer is.   Writing is a passing whim, a burning urge, cash in hand. Writing is.   A writer is self-improving, ever-learning, word-adoring. A writer is.   Writing is success, failure, hard work, pleasure, feeling better. Writing is. " bing writers " by  kbowenwriter  is licensed under  CC BY-SA 2.0 .

He woke more than an hour before the alarm’s shrill call but did not move, counting the pulses of green light from the pharmacy sign downstairs as they washed over his sallow skin. Ten more flashes and he eased himself silently out of bed. She stirred, arched her back and pushed her full, blue-veined breasts into the space he had left. The movement caused the duvet to slip to the floor, filling the gap between their single bed and the cot. As he moved towards the door to the kitchen, he turned to look at her. Dark, short hair spiked the pillow and the lumpen shape of her thighs covered all the mattress. From the cot there was a gentle suckling noise heralding an imminent wail for food. In the green gasps of light, he found his uniform: trousers, shirt and waistcoat and the previous day’s underwear. Clean pants and socks were still hanging outside on the plastic line stretched across the tiny balcony, wet and limp between bibs and baby clothes. Rushing his feet into dull shoes, he f

  Today’s the Glorious Twelfth, they say. You’re not a grouse, you’ll feel okay. You’ll get your gun, and gundog too, But beware the rules – there are a few: Tweed jacket, shooting boots and cap, Oh, don’t you look a dashing chap. Next, of course, you will desire A sporting target for your fire. A bird that doesn’t fly too fast Or zigzags as it’s going past. That doesn’t have the wit or gall To not, in fact, appear at all! For once, would you go out and play without the guns? Find another way to spend your money, waste your time? Just walk the moors, or maybe climb up hills and crags, breath in fresh air, enjoy the sunshine, out with care and cost, the status, snobbery, too? Display to them the real you, The lowly birth, the warts and all? No, you’ll never stand that tall It’s easier to shoot and rack A bird that cannot fire back. But now suppose you went one day And found that things were not that way, that you had now excha

  Chaos rushed in with gleeful violence and pillaging. Cults arose like The Lunacy Markers, all demanding air time to shout down the overtired experts. Each night the Moon Clock went backwards and forwards to random times, with no discernible sequence. A probe was sent out to the satellite’s surface to hopefully disrupt any illusion or confirm a baffling truth.           Then one Monday midnight five and a half weeks later, the Moon Clock returned to twelve o’clock. Order restored, for one night at least. The Lunacy Markers insisted that this was the beginning of a new sequence, 'hitherto undreamt of'. Of course, they were obliquely announcing the end of the world. All the other cults fell in line, rushing to confirm the end times according to the Moon Clock. And yet, if you asked any one of these zealots, they couldn’t give clear justification of their doomsaying. The fact remained that no-one on Earth could comprehend the strange times they had witnessed. By this point th

  It was Monday midnight when the moon revealed its new face. Apparently everyone in the world wasn’t looking in the time it took for a giant analogue clock to appear on the light side of the satellite.           Other news was eclipsed for the rest of the night and, when daylight came, journalists spent the next few hours quizzing lunar experts on if this was a stunt, who perpetrated it, how they managed such a feat and for what purpose. No organisation or creative collective laid genuine claim to the Moon Clock event. All anyone knew was that neither the big nor little hand had moved from twelve o’clock since the big reveal.           While some nations lost sight of the spectacle due to amassments of cloud and smog, the remaining clear-sighted countries confirmed that the moon still had a clock on its face. They also announced that the hands had now moved to the time five to ten. No-one knew why.           Some claimed that the moon had asserted itself to their particular time