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perhappened mag
issue 1: CARNIVAL

a twelve-foot garden in
hazel park, co. galway

LAOISE NÍ RAGHALLAIGH
​We hung string lights in the garden the other night. 
They twist around the washing line we never used, trembling
in the Galway breeze. I’d have liked a volley of lights;
enveloping the apple tree, criss-crossing the shed, 
a single spark on every petal that falls. 
It would add dimension, highlight 
where ours ends, and beyond begins.
But this will do, for now. 
Burnt sugar lingers in the air,
a little offshoot of scent wending through the open window
from where I left the biscuits in the oven 
a minute too long. 
Silence. No chatter of voices, no clamour
of life in this green. A two-person fair.
While washing dishes I fixate on the clothesline,
swaying visibly now that it has things to sway.
Ten blinking lights like a line of owls,
Keeping us company in the dark.

Laoise Ní Raghallaigh is an Irish writer, with an interest in long-form fiction and essays. Her work has previously been published in school magazines and local commemorative journals. She is currently studying Creative Writing at NUI Galway.
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header photo: bradley pisney (unsplash)
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