Surface Tension by Maurice Devitt

Through an open window

he hears the warm clip of conversation

from a neighbour’s garden,

and, though he can’t make out

the words, he has a strange feeling

they’re talking about him.

Yes, they’d had that argument

about the height of the party wall,

and, when their cat went missing,

it had taken him three days to realise

he’d locked her in the garden shed,

but maybe, it was just about last night:

the dinner party, how he’d stumbled

into silence and started to cry.

Winner of the Trocaire/Poetry Ireland and Poems for Patience competitions, he has been nominated for Pushcart, Forward and Best of the Net Prizes and been runner-up in the Cuirt New Writing Prize, Interpreter’s House Poetry Competition and the Cork Literary Review Manuscript Competition. He published his debut collection ‘Growing Up in Colour’ with Doire Press.