A lovely start to the year – a writerly celebration of Nollaig na mBan (Christmas of the Women). It was an Irish tradition that women had a day off household work on the feast of the Epiphany, the 6th January, the last day of the Christmas season).

On Wednesday 5th January at 17.30 ET/10.30pm UK time) the Irish Network DC has arranged a zoom reading of work from North Star, an anthology of work by female writers from Northern Ireland. This  was published by Women Aloud NI, a burgeoning network of women writers.

Angeline King, Gráinne Tobin, Shelley Tracey and I will be reading our work from the anthology.

The event is supported by the Irish Embassy in the USA, the Northern Ireland Bureau (the Northern Ireland Executive’s diplomatic arm in the USA) and the Irish American Partnership.

I’m particularly pleased to be reading a poem which has a link to America. As for many Irish people, emigration has resulted in my having relatives across the United States and this poem is about an appearance of my grandfather at his great-grand-daughter’s wedding, all the way from America.