Mark McDonnell had a long career in industry, living and working in Barcelona, Miami and Cambridge, England. He then trained as a psychotherapist and began to devote more time to his writing. His work has been published in Ink, Sweat and Tears and Rialto
Pietà
Dead in a diaper, he lies back,
peaceful in his mother’s lap,
lovely, laid at the open womb,
the lust of all his powers gone,
done now with his bright-burning
failures; perhaps, at last, returning
to her – to where she wants him.
© Mark McDonnell
The Photographer
Tried to do portraits
of tired men of my generation.
They sat for me and rehearsed old jokes,
then took me out for tapas and wine
under plane trees in sunny squares
and sold me versions of their lives,
or complained of change and statins.
Some peered back in through my lens,
so they saw their shoes in the air
and, on the ground, thinning hair,
the checked shirt their wife had ironed,
upside-down over round midriff.
Generally, they stooped,
eyes not meeting mine,
but I needed to see them.
I hit upon a promising technique.
You set an ultra-slow shutter-speed.
You allow the subject to move at will,
then, when you develop them,
they emerge as curls of smoke,
each one twists, transparent,
unique in its coiling, untied from the earth.
Glorious manes in subtle shades of grey,
they ride the air
until ushered from the frame
by the gentlest of breezes.
© Mark McDonnell