Attracta Fahy’s background is Nursing/Social Care. She lives in Co.Galway, works as a Psychotherapist, anda single mother to three children. She completed her MA in Writing NUIG ‘17. She was October winner in Irish Times; New Irish Writing 2019, Pushcart, and Best of Web nominee, included in a number of Anthologies, shortlisted for 2018 Over The Edge New Writer of the year, and longlisted in 2019. Shortlisted for Allingham Poetry competition both 2019 & 2020. She has been published in Stinging Fly, Banshee, Poetry Ireland Review, Honest Ulsterman, Poethead, Orbis, Live Encounters, InkSweat&Tears, Rare Swan Press, Silver Birch Press and several other journals at home and abroad. Attracta was a featured reader at the January OTE Open Reading in Galway City Library. She is a featured reader with Pulitzer Prize Poet Paul Muldoon and Professor Adrian Rice at the NM Irish American Society 12th February ’21. Fly on the Wall Poetry published her debut chapbook collection Dinner in the Fields, in March’20.

Depending On Moods You Could Be Killed

1.

It must be me, I’d imagined, 
coercive control did not exist,

his face in mine, deafening obscenities, 
mother complex, projected to me,
wild animal calling me bitch, 
the smell of hate, 

disgust crawled like worms over my body, 
until I hated myself 

the dry swallow still sticks in my mouth,
his disgust—

how it tells you
you’re a piece of shit

all gradual
you learn to gulp the fear, the rage
until it all becomes normal

because
God is not conscious, and chaos 
is normal, where the earliest condition 
is disorder. 
my heart flesh, 
my perception, 
my lack of perfection

children trapped, too: 
careful, don't fill the dishwasher

depending on moods, you could be killed

2.

One night in twenty years I stayed away. 
Never again. 
The strimmer gutted my flowers,
angry hands ripped my clothes 

He was away three nights a week, 
work, he said, and we learned to breathe

The judge said it was not domestic violence
he hasn't hit you 
a hole in the door when he threw his keys 
his house too, she said, closing the book,
come back when you have a case.
Small towns. They knew each other socially.

From there every day a lorry of fear at our door,
Guards powerless if the judge doesn’t act
Social workers powerless if the judge doesn’t act

Don’t ask me why I stayed
Nothing is rational when you live with violence

Relieved in the end when another woman
took my burden.


3.

I’d trained his eye to see the fineness,
to seek the sensual 
in what’s subtle

He bought me a chain, double circles
intertwined, 
moonstruck silver pieces, my dream bracelet 

I’d believed I’d crafted his iron heart
to love
the love was mine
wrapped with his debt
I was chained to both and the bank 
owned us,

My heart heavy 
I couldn’t wear my skin and bone body,
I was air
Living outside a self I’d long forgotten 

Now she has the jewellery,
the prize she thinks she wants 
and I his children, his debt,
the empty promise 
of trust.

Do It

After Charles Bukowski
 
 
If you are going to try, go all the way,
do it, do it, do it, do it, and I did.
I went all the way down to five and a half stone,
doing it.
 
All the way to bone, shedding my body,
ultimately yours, stamps, stickers,
imprints, impressions, what to be,
who not to be.
 
I sunk into the deep,
took my anger, its sword of discernment,
love, a lantern to light shadowy guts.
 
In this body, bind and wound
were one, like ivy clings to trees,
all bound in hunger.
Everybody became everybody’s shadow.
 
I sunk into death, its bloodied waters,
insatiable starvation in protest wanted more,
and more, to be less, and less, and less again.
 
A world with blinded eyes refused.
I smashed their convex image,
turned the stone which formed these bones,
the murky underworld,
shady maggots, snails, and ants, coiled in dark.
I clawed my way up from there.