After The Ice Age

A poem and a Happy New Year!

After The Ice Age

The glacial retreat
left highland boulders
scattered
across the Clyde valley -

Cold grey granite hearts.

But I require no evidence 
of your leaving,
nor any lasting proof
that you ever once lay here.

Wishing everyone a Happy New Year and a good 2025. And thank you to everyone who has liked or commented on a story or poem. I’ve read a lot of great writing here and look forward to reading more.

I’ve been unwell the last couple of days. My cat has also been under the weather. I'm hoping she picks up after a trip to the vet today.

Tomorrow I might start a 365 short story reading challenge. I will likely post my daily reads to notes and maybe do a roundup in a main post every so often. First story will be Lord Dunsany’s humorous The Hoard of the Gibbelins, which is available to read online.

Hoping to serialise some longer pieces in 2025. Anyway, 2025 has already arrived in some places and it will be here in under five hours. My wish as a developmental editor is for more speculative fiction, more horror/Gothic, and more historical fiction to land in my inbox! Here's hoping.

Update: this poem made it to the Top in Fiction list for poetry. I recommend writers and readers follow Top in Fiction to find new Substack writers or as a way to nominate your work for the weekly list. And look, the 2025 badges are a new colour!