around the world in a moment

(20)

From a window, a woman watches the lowering sun

throw shadows across a forest in Gotland.

Near Chicago, a landscape architect jogs round the lake,

wondering when he'll next create a new park.

From bed, in a cottage at the top of a hill in Rathmullan,

a bereaved mother binge-watches Offspring.

A small girl from Kigali Instagrams her first ever

mandazi with cinnamon.

At a stop sign on an empty street in Bologna,

a man clutches his chest.

A boy stares at fish, visible, still, below the frozen lid

of a pond in Ontario, and tries to break open a hole.

In La Paz, a toddler stares up at her father,

as he resists embracing her gran on her birthday.

A newly-retired chef leaves a Cajun fish stew

on the window sill at a neighbour’s in Weymouth.

Down a laneway in Adelaide, a driver beep-beeps

as his lorry reverses, spooking a horse with a rider.

In Zimbabwe, a guy in a Landrover crosses a vlei

to watch lion approaching a pan.

After another digital school day, a teenager drops

from a bridge in Beijing.

Hour after hour in Phnom Penh, a writer taps at a keyboard,

bottle of vodka beside him.

A single mum in Dundrum, with a son doing the Leaving,

calls Niall on the radio.

In a care home on Jeju, a five-year-old’s grandfather dies

as, outside, the child's breath clouds over the window.

On the island of Aran, a lad waves at the stranger

he plans to meet and invite on a date.

At the Cork South Infirmary, a woman is told that her test

is negative, her relief, so enormous, she longs to hug someone.

Afric McGlinchey