Live Encounters Poetry & Writing 16th Anniversary Volume Two
November- December 2025
The Cure, poems by Sinéad McClure.
The Cure
A spot on the back
of your mother’s hand
the colour of taupe
or overripe banana
the piece of me you snapped
to rub against her skin,
you almost sliced me in two.
Such jagged amputation
copied all around us now.
The old door on the big shed,
the scar in the woods,
the strike-through
across night skies, the fear
in your dogs eyes.
Your mother believed in my cure
and that is all that mattered.
The summer the hare came to stay
My neighbor told me her cat took a hare,
a fully grown hare in its feline mouth.
I remember the summer the hare
came to visit our garden.
He pressed himself among
the creeping buttercups
as we watched on.
For the first time in months
you were lifted by the sight.
We spent days watching
from the back window
careful not to disturb his patch.
The wild flowers made a neat rectangular shape
until the growing leveret disappeared beneath them.
Where did the hare go?
Why did he leave?
If I could go back I’d tell you;
the hare went to the mountains.
Tall air helps his lungs.
You were weakening then
I hardly noticed you dangling
in the jaws of the big cat.
© Sinéad McClure
Sinéad McClure’s writing is published on radio, and in anthologies, magazines and online including; Live Encounters, The Honest Ulsterman, , Southword, The Stinging Fly and many other fine publications. Sinéad was shortlisted for the Patrick Kavanagh Award in 2024, and was a runner-up in the Mairtín Crawford Poetry Award 2025.