Clare O'Brien
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clareobrien.bsky.social
Clare O'Brien
@clareobrien.bsky.social
Writer. Music fan. Poet in Residence, Inverewe Garden, Scottish Highlands. Will block A.I. slop & associated evangelists.
Poetry chapbooks 'Breathing Out Becomes White And Snowfall' & 'Who Am I Supposed To Be Driving?' out now.
Web: clarevobrien.weebly.com
Haha!! Reminded me of this:
November 7, 2025 at 4:22 PM
Here's my #poem for the #poemsabout #lockeddoors prompt.
It's an #ekphrastic poem this time - at least, I'm not sure it works without my photo? I came across these stone dogs by chance & instantly wanted to write about them.
@thebrokenspine.co.uk @alanparrywriter.co.uk
#poetry #poetsofbluesky
November 7, 2025 at 10:24 AM
After several days of unrelenting rain I finally made it over to Inverewe Garden to see my Autumn #poem in situ in the Wet Garden! Check the alt text if you can't read it easily. Needless to say - the poem was written on a sunnier afternoon. 🌞
#poetrycommunity #writingcommunity #poetinresidence
November 6, 2025 at 4:57 PM
Didn't get as much reading done in October as usual. However: properly digested a collection of Seamus Heaney's I've had for some time, re-read Deborah Curtis's memoir of her tragically flawed husband Ian, and devoured another of Jim Butcher's Harry Dresden thrillers.
📚💙 #booksky
November 1, 2025 at 1:05 PM
Up McCaig's Tower in Oban today.
Observed by crow and cat.
October 30, 2025 at 3:04 PM
My contribution for #poemsabout #BurnForTheCamera was written shortly after the death by suicide of an old friend who was a performing artist. I was trying to understand the pressure performers are under - from fame, from fans, from the press.
@thebrokenspine.co.uk @alanparrywriter.co.uk
October 24, 2025 at 7:53 AM
Bit late to the party with this, work & family stuff has kept me from my writing lately! So #ImperfectMe is the ideal theme. This is a WIP, trying to get at how it feels when we isolate ourselves from what feels like an unfriendly world.
#poemsabout
@alanparrywriter.co.uk
@thebrokenspine.co.uk
October 10, 2025 at 3:33 PM
September reading - a play based on a novel, a supernatural thriller set in Chicago, an Irish short story collection, a novel about a rare vinyl dealer and his highly unusual dog, and a history of Doctor Who.
📚💙 #booksky
October 1, 2025 at 4:21 PM
Delighted to be part of today's launch of brand new Glasgow litjournal 'Sextet', with my flash 'Death Sentences' & poem 'Watching Gracie at TRNSMT'. This issue of the journal's tied to an exhibition in Glasgow's Six Foot Gallery, both of which have the theme Future/Past. [cont]
September 30, 2025 at 10:14 AM
Delighted to have my poem 'tl:dr', which deals with the topics of phone addiction and invasive technology, included in this wonderfully varied new anthology!
September 29, 2025 at 5:40 PM
Here'd something which might fit the #AMPHIBIAN #PoetryTheme ...? It's a poem I wrote for a multimedia exhibition at Inverewe Garden's Sawyer Gallery in 2024, while poet in residence.
Thanks to @thepaulconnolly.bsky.social for organising this!
September 29, 2025 at 3:23 PM
Just seen new ballet 'Mary Queen Of Scots' at Eden Court in Inverness. Scottish Ballet continues to innovate and amaze - what a terrific production this was. Dancing, staging, music, lighting & shadowplay contrinuted to a surreal sense of entering the minds of the characters. Immensely moving.
September 27, 2025 at 11:17 PM
Books finished in August were variously and beautifully deranged. One scurrilous exposé of the lunacy of privilege, an exploration of musical madness, a fantasy of witchcraft and divination, poetry exploring how landscape can disorder time, and a novel about schizophrenia.
📚💙 #booksky
September 1, 2025 at 10:28 PM
My husband just told me someone online said Nigel Farage looks like Parker from 'Thunderbirds' and now I can't think of him any other way. 😂
September 1, 2025 at 9:46 PM
Hi @hool415.bsky.social & #poetrycommunity
This is an unpublished something I've been messing about with for ages and I'm still not sure it works. Any suggestions welcome!
#promptcombo #winged
September 1, 2025 at 2:19 PM
Just been interviewed for our local paper the @gairlochtimes.org.uk about my poetry & work as poet in residence at Inverewe Garden in Poolewe, Wester Ross. Pardon wobbly phone scan from print copy!! Subscribe to the digital edition at gairlochtimes.org.uk for this and all the local news & views. 😀
August 30, 2025 at 3:04 PM
Hi @rfsmith.bsky.social - here's my poem for this week's #promptcombo #banality - an everyday trip to the local swimming pool, which turned toxic! Appeared back in 2019 in 'The Anthology of Contemporary Gothic Verse' from @theemmapress.bsky.social
August 25, 2025 at 12:50 PM
For the #promptcombo theme #woods I'd like to share my poem 'Dead Wood'. Published in Cosmic Daffodil Journal back in 2023, but inspired by a walk in the wake of a storm on the woodland trail at Inverewe Garden, where I'm currently Poet in Residence.
#poetrycommunity @victoriaspires.bsky.social
August 18, 2025 at 10:10 AM
Thanks John. The magazine actually illustrated it...
August 8, 2025 at 10:45 AM
Something a bit less serious from me today for #PoemsAbout #BlackSky. Published in Scottish free magazine 'Snack' back in 2019. Thanks as always to @alanparrywriter.co.uk
@thebrokenspine.co.uk for hosting!
August 8, 2025 at 8:11 AM
My July reading was somewhat psychogeographical - London and its environs, the south coast, rural Cheshire.
Well, plus a crazy novel about necromancy in an alternative, magical Chicago. With dinosaurs.
📚💙 #booksky
August 2, 2025 at 11:05 AM
Here's my contribution for this week's
#PoemsAbout #starcrossed - an old one, this, first published in the now-seemingly-and-sadly-defunct Cabinet of Heed.
#poetrycommunity
@alanparrywriter.co.uk
@thebrokenspine.co.uk
August 1, 2025 at 9:38 AM
This is one of the traditional ways in which unwelcome people have been greeted in Scotland. 🤭
July 26, 2025 at 8:15 AM
Today's front page of Scottish newspaper @scotnational.bsky.social
July 25, 2025 at 4:43 PM
If you're in Wester Ross in August, come to the launch party of our mythical magical new exhibition at the Sawyer Gallery at Inverewe Garden in Poolewe! Paintings, poetry, and much more. 9th August, 1pm.
#ScottishHighlands #art #poetry #mythology
July 24, 2025 at 6:56 PM