JGHeraghty | Poetry

Tower Bridge, 2023   London was never one of my top picks for the Before 30 list, however Shane told me he enjoyed his short layover in London while he was traveling, so I figured it was a good destination to go to on our first trip away together. We planned a short trip to London for New Years in 2019. Pre-pandemic, the 'before times' if you will. We stayed in a luxurious 4 star hotel in the center of London, near Tower Bridge so we would be close to a couple of attractions. Before going, we purchased a thing called 'London Pass', I think it goes by something else now. The pass included tickets to some top attractions such as the Big Bus, London Eye, Madame Tussauds and Sea Life.   At the time, we hadn't yet established how we would plan out our trips. We went to London as part of a wider trip from Birmingham. Shane was spending Christmas in Birmingham with his family, so I met him there, and took a train from Birmingham to London to see out the New Year.  We were ...

Sagrada Familia, 2018 I went to Barcelona for a womENcourage conference back in 2017. It was my first flight, my first time trekking around on my own outside my small hometown. My parents came with me (also my mother's first time abroad) and we stayed in this hotel in Calella. Calella, while a lovely place, was not ideal as it was 2+ hours away from the University I was attending for the conference.  The first night was one of my best memories: it was torrential raining and we all got soaked in seconds. The whole night was lightning flash after lightning flash, and the three of us found ourselves hiding out in a soon-to-shut Burger King.  In the end though, we ended up having to brave the storm, ducking under shutters that were almost 3-quarters shut. I felt like we were in a movie, making it out at the last minute! haha That whole night, my room lit up again and again with the flashes of lightning, and the rattling of thunder. I don't know what I love so much about stormy wea...

Before I am 30, I aim to travel to 10 countries!  While very achievable for most, I have only started traveling in the past few years. So when I set that goal, I didn't even think I would get to 10, if I'm honest. Obviously, the pandemic happened and I had to pause for a while, but we're still on track: we put a large dent in the list in 2022 alone - visiting a total of 8 countries in the year. I always thought of travel as something terrifying, I was mostly nervous about food. I love other cultures, and I can get excited about taking the plane, train, car or hike to the next attraction.  It is immensely important to me to go out into the world and see it. I have found my past few years, I feel incredibly isolated and as though I don't have control of my own life. I feel like I was born into a society with rules on how you should live your life, in stages I mean: find a man, get married, have kids, grow old. I'll talk more about the lessons I learn along my journey,...

Hey everyone,  It's no secret I have not been around in a while.. my apologies. Let me catch you up - the Pandemic happened and I found a couple of new hobbies. HappyHousing was born and is getting raised by the minute. We went on a whole series of adventures last year, I can't wait to write all about them. I learned a lot about myself and how to become the person I have always focused toward being, and it's going well so far, I'm making great progress. So today, I wanted to talk about somethng different. A lot of my writing has been in the form of poetry over the years but if there is anything I have learned most about myself it's that I kind of see things with rose-tinted goggles, romantising life. I realise my view is my art - I think Shane taught me that. He doesn't take many photographs (and I always complain about it), but when he does, they are spectactular. I mean, they're from his angle, his perspective and they're worlds apart from the photogra...

The day I wrote this next poem, I started writing this post. I have written many drafts. Each version filled with anger, confusion, a little dash of denial, splash of oversharing. Primarily defeat.  I thought by releasing The Essence and the Detail , I had said all I needed to say about the people and events of the past few years. But I guess not. Funny thing how we think we can just shut our eyes and keep out the blaring light.  It's difficult to tell a story without actually giving specifics, I'll tell you that. This next one is about a relationship I experienced a few years ago, while I was inside the relationship, I was screaming to get out, but did not know how to. I forged characters in my poetry in an attempt to say it out loud, but I failed miserably. And though years have since past, it doesn't get any easier to speak up. To say that, however, is to form a paradox from the poem itself. Freedom can mean many things. For me, to have been freed meant I was back at the...

Happy Thursday guys! Some time has passed since you heard from me, I did say I would be infrequent here. I have actually made some progress however with my poetry book. It's a work in progress and I believe it's going well so far! Something about me many people don't know is that I'm political. I'm a democrat, with a modest understanding of the republicans. I don't talk about it much because it makes for awkward conversation. Short breaths, steam coming from the ears of my recipients. Trust me. Treacle. Although I know this, I have dabbled in a few political poems over the past few years, centralising on the Irish rebellion and, well, general Irish politics. But in some instances, I have found myself squishing world political points into my stanzas, soaking in what the media feed me, venting through the letters. I have some passionate opinions on American politics and even more on European. Between Brexit and Trump, I feel my head imploding slowly. Tha...

Happy August Guys! It's been a while since you last heard from me. And in that time, I've changed a lot about myself. I told myself I was finished writing. I felt like it was draining all the happiness out of me. It was as if I needed to focus on the negatives in order to see the deeper side to things. And thus, write about them. I convinced myself it was the end. But then, it was as if the universe was screaming at me to change my mind, when I was sent a 'recommended for you' post in my email. It was an article on why creative minds are more likely to become depressed. It was about a lady called Nancy Andreasen, a neuroscientist and author of The Creative Brain , who believed that a creative person should embrace their creativity, rather than shutting it out. She believes that depression occurs due to a persons reaction toward the world, and creative people tend to be less adaptive to situations. They question and wonder, and as a result, they can develop depress...