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The Literary Professionals Welcome to The Literary Professionals (formerly Walsh Communications). We are a literary services a

Submissions alert
18/05/2023

Submissions alert

Submissions are open for Crannóg 59, the autumn issue, between Monday May 1st and Wednesday May 31st. Send up to three poems under 50 lines or one short story under 2000 words. Submit through their website at crannogmagazine.com/submit or by email to [email protected]

Some recent feedback from clients...
18/05/2023

Some recent feedback from clients...

This is so gorgeous. I love the thoughtfulness in making poetry accessible via these channels
04/05/2023

This is so gorgeous. I love the thoughtfulness in making poetry accessible via these channels

Though I have always loved the poet Billy Collins, this very special poem - The Lanyard - has taken on so much more mean...
04/05/2023

Though I have always loved the poet Billy Collins, this very special poem - The Lanyard - has taken on so much more meaning for me since becoming a mother. It's the ultimate ode to motherhood and the perfect description of the miniscule little moments of joy that make it all worthwhile. Treasure every sticky-fingered little drawing you receive from your children.

The Lanyard
BY BILLY COLLINS

The other day I was ricocheting slowly
off the blue walls of this room,
moving as if underwater from typewriter to piano,
from bookshelf to an envelope lying on the floor,
when I found myself in the L section of the dictionary
where my eyes fell upon the word lanyard.

No cookie nibbled by a French novelist
could send one into the past more suddenly—
a past where I sat at a workbench at a camp
by a deep Adirondack lake
learning how to braid long thin plastic strips
into a lanyard, a gift for my mother.

I had never seen anyone use a lanyard
or wear one, if that’s what you did with them,
but that did not keep me from crossing
strand over strand again and again
until I had made a boxy
red and white lanyard for my mother.

She gave me life and milk from her breasts,
and I gave her a lanyard.
She nursed me in many a sick room,
lifted spoons of medicine to my lips,
laid cold face-cloths on my forehead,
and then led me out into the airy light

and taught me to walk and swim,
and I, in turn, presented her with a lanyard.
Here are thousands of meals, she said,
and here is clothing and a good education.
And here is your lanyard, I replied,
which I made with a little help from a counselor.

Here is a breathing body and a beating heart,
strong legs, bones and teeth,
and two clear eyes to read the world, she whispered,
and here, I said, is the lanyard I made at camp.
And here, I wish to say to her now,
is a smaller gift—not the worn truth

that you can never repay your mother,
but the rueful admission that when she took
the two-tone lanyard from my hand,
I was as sure as a boy could be
that this useless, worthless thing I wove
out of boredom would be enough to make us even.

“The Lanyard” from The Trouble With Poetry: and Other Poems by Billy Collins, copyright © 2005 by Billy Collins. Used by permission of Random House, an imprint and division of Penguin Random House LLC. All rights reserved.

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I have just finished work on (editiorial and project management) this fascinating book: Sailing to Antarctica by Joe Phe...
07/03/2023

I have just finished work on (editiorial and project management) this fascinating book: Sailing to Antarctica by Joe Phelan.
It’s lovely to see a book come to fruition from the inital rough manuscript to a gorgeous piece of work that author is so proud to hold in their hands. It’s a really lovely part of my job to help make writers dreams come true.

I worked with Carrowmore publishing consultancy on getting the book to print and the finished product is just beautiful.

Here’s a little bit more about the book:
https://theliteraryprofessionals.ie/sailing-to-antarctica/

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