Promises made at Lombards - Damien B Donnelly

That haunting, that dance-

we brushed soft shoe against hard surface,

a pre-millennium stream of slow smoke- jazz notes

under low lights at Lombards with its wine by the bottle

so that we swayed

to notes too complicated to catch hold of.

We were saxophones playing pink elephants between the duke’s

darkness and the white lights of the blinding dawn.

Prisoners to the poison, but we stepped across that floor-

already haunted, devouring desire before it was kissed

by the ghost we’d promised each other not to shake.

Bio:

Damien, 45, Dublin born, returned to Ireland in 2019 after 23 years in Paris, London and Amsterdam, working in the fashion industry. His writing focuses on identity, sexuality and fragility. His daily interests revolve around falling over and learning how to get back up while baking cakes.

         His short stories have been featured in Second Chance from Original Writing, Body Horror from Gehenna & Hinnom, A Page from My Life from Harper Collins & poetry in Eyewear, The Runt Magazine, Black Bough, Coffin Bell, Barren Magazine & Fahmidan Journal. His debut poetry collection Eat the Storms was published by The Hedgehog Press. He hosts the weekly poetry podcast Eat The Storms.