Yorkshire Writers' Lunch

He smells, tastes, feels shadows in the abyss: darkness, and the sweet scent of violets. In desolation, he retches, spewing his fear. She cradles his shivering, bandages the burnt and violated face, conceals his rage, feeds his hopes, writes his anguish, helps him count the days and catches his tears with a kiss. This was written in thoughts of my father after the tank he commanded was blown up during the war.   Catching flames across his face, he spent the next few weeks in hospital – not knowing whether he would ever see again, until the ‘facepack’ the doctors had put on, was removed.   It smelt, he said, of Parma violets, but it worked – he temporarily lost his eyebrows and eyelashes, but his sight was saved, with not a mark on his face.   The flames had effectively sealed his eyelids together, but that had protected his sight.   He dictated one letter home to his mother during this time, written by a nurse, but didn’t tell his mother unt...

Welcome to the Creationarium.   It is a laboratory.   Of sorts.   If you look around, you will see many interesting things. Along one wall, there is a long table upon which sit a large number of test tubes.   Some are still, some are quietly fizzing, a few are popping.   Some are colourful, others less so.   These test tubes contain the many memories, accumulated over your life so far.   Some are spilling over into the neighbouring test tube, causing a little fogginess. Some are almost igniting as they mingle with others.   Some retain their original detail.   Others have become a little less clear over time. Yes, these are the memories. Then, on a shelf high above, there are the bottles of good intentions.   There are a great deal of these.   Some will be uncorked and used almost immediately.   Others will never see the light of day. In the corner, you can see a stove.   On it, there is a pot full of bubbling liq...

Matilda had never wanted the clock.   She looked up at the elaborate brass dial, and the dark oak case, gleaming with polish. “We’ve always said it would come to you, Tilly,” said her father. Matilda couldn’t remember this ever being said to her. Perhaps she would have said, politely, that she didn’t really want it. Or perhaps not. The clock stood in the hall of her childhood home like a sentry,   sternly guarding the spindly Queen Anne side tables, the porcelain figurines, and the unread, leather-bound books. She tried to imagine how it would look in the 1970s semi she shared with James. She pictured the clock, squeezed between the Ikea bookcase and the coat rack.   She shuddered. James nodded appreciatively as her father pointed out the clock’s carved columns, it’s intricate finials, and fine hands. “It’s eighteenth century,” said her father. “We won’t have space in the new place,” said her mother, tears brimming in her ...

Not quite three, too young to know why father conducts the Third Programme in a ground-floor cul-de-sac maisonette while mother washes dishes, cries. Father conducts the Third Programme - violin concerto, slow movement, waiting for a breakfast egg to boil. In a ground-floor cul-de-sac maisonette between railway lines and by-pass the cat has not slunk home. While mother washes dishes, cries, boy clings to apron strings, mystified, too young to be told Bimbo has died.