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marandina

@marandina.bsky.social
246 followers 98 following 1.4K posts

Writer, poet, editor, loves sport, movies and other stuff. Writes fiction at abctales.com/user/marandina

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BookWormSat @bookwormsat.bsky.social · 13h
‘Fall, leaves, fall; die, flowers, away; Lengthen night and shorten day; Every leaf speaks bliss to me Fluttering from the autumn tree.’ ~ Emily Brontë. @racheldeering.bsky.social here for the rest of a rural #BookWormSat
Hans Thoma (1839–1924), Autumn Tree, Wiesenthal (c 1862-63) painting.
Autumn birch, landscape in background.
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Sean McNulty @thispersona.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
Story: Say No To Him www.abctales.com/story/sean-m... Dust, rhubarb, and rebellion
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marandina @marandina.bsky.social · 02/10/2026
Delighted that my ghost story is Pick of the Day at the brilliant @abctales.bsky.social 💙 Thank you! 🙏
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marandina @marandina.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
My latest story 'Frankenplot: Ghost Story - Uphill' Halloween shenanigans www.abctales.com/story/marand...
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Paul @paulwritespoems.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
Let’s share a warm welcome for the latest featured poet in the Poetic Voice series, the excellent @annestgwilym.bsky.social
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ABCtales @abctales.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Capturing the cadence of the classic original. Ewan’s ‘Frankenplot: The Hacker’ is adroitly done and is the Pick of the Day. www.abctales.com/story/ewan/f... Please share if you can.
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Sean McNulty @thispersona.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
Story: Messages www.abctales.com/story/sean-m... Flatbreads, fenians, and blind bastards.
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BookWormSat @bookwormsat.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
‘A foraging wild creature, intent above all upon survival, is as strong as the grass.’ ~ Richard Adams, Watership Down. This #BookWormSat is also #InternationalRabbitDay so we will get lost down our own rabbit hole of the rabbits, hares and all small furry creatures of literature. Do join us. 🐇
🖼️ Rabbits, William Jacob Hays Sr, 1859.
Painting of one rabbit sat upright on a cut tree stump surrounded by six rabbits sitting and lying beneath him / her on the grass, there are leaves on the grass and trees and sky in the distance.
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Annest Gwilym @annestgwilym.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
Just a gentle reminder that my poetry book Contemplation of Roses is still available from the link below. Very grateful if you could buy or leave a review. 👇
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marandina @marandina.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
@racheldeering.bsky.social Morning. Happy autumn equinox!
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ABCtales @abctales.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
The theme of autumn has inspired some wonderful poetry this week. Here’s another to add to the gallery. Robert Craven’s ‘God’s perfect little time machines’ is beautifully done. www.abctales.com/story/robert... Please share if you can.
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Rachel Deering @racheldeering.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
‘Now look, your grace,’ said Sancho, ‘what you see over there aren't giants, but windmills, and what seems to be arms are just their sails, that go around in the wind and turn the millstone.’ ‘Obviously,’ replied Don Quijote, ‘you don't know much about adventures.’ ~ Cervantes. #BookWormSat
José Moreno Carbonero (1860-1942), Don Quixote and the Windmills (c 1900), painting.
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marandina @marandina.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
Happy #Caturday
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Sean McNulty @thispersona.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
Story: For Present Company www.abctales.com/story/sean-m... Reunion, perversion, and lackeys.
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BookWormSat @bookwormsat.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
‘For there is nothing lost, that may be found, if sought.’ ~ Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene. @racheldeering.bsky.social here for the rest of a Renaissance #BookWormSat 🖼️ John Melhuish
Description from Peter Nahum at Leicester Galleries: ‘This mesmerising work is a vision of Acrasia kneeling with her victim in the garden of the Bower of Bliss. Like the sorceress Circe who turned Ulysses’s men into swine and whom Strudwick had painted two years before,(3) Acrasia seduced men and transformed them into beasts. The defeated knight, who has succumbed to Acrasia’s charms and sipped her fatal potion, lies listlessly in her arms, at her mercy. His armour is scattered with rose blossoms, his shield rests futilely in the branches, and his sword lays idle upon the ground. Beyond the bower, a lake glistens in a golden sunset.’
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Rachel Deering @racheldeering.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
‘The waies, through which my weary steps I guyde, In this delightful land of Faery… My tedious trauell doe forget thereby; And when I gin to feele decay of might, It strength to me supplies and chears my dulled spright.’ ~ Spenser #BookWormSat
🖼️ Prince Arthur and the Fairy Queen by Johann Heinrich Füssli, c. 1788
Painting, The Fairy Queen stands centrally in a cream gown with a teal bow. Her arm is outstretched. Prince Arthur is kneeling to the right in deep shadow.
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marandina @marandina.bsky.social · 19/09/2026
A trip to my lucky pub for the footie ⚽ C'mon you lions! 🦁 #SpursvVilla
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BookWormSat @bookwormsat.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
'...and the fox cannot defend himself from wolves. One must therefore be a fox to recognise traps, and a lion to frighten wolves.' -Machiavelli This Saturday marks 610 years since one of the Medici entered the world, #BookWormSat will travel back in time to the Renaissance! 🦁
The Lion of St Mark by Vittore Carpaccio. Painting of a winged lion holding a book open in which there is a Latin phrase.
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Black Bough Poetry @blackboughpoetry.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
'there is a true sense of hope vibrantly alive in these necessary poems' @louloumach.bsky.social on @racheldeering.bsky.social's #poetry collection 'In the Shadow of Gods' www.blackboughpoetry.com/rachel-deering
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ABCtales @abctales.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
This is our wonderful story of the week! Another thoroughly entertaining tale of the indefatigable Amandarella from Eric Marsh. www.abctales.com/story/eric-m...
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Annest Gwilym @annestgwilym.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
That time of year . . . By Eliot Hodgkin, 1955. #eliothodgkin #stilllife #botanicalart
Painting of three apples with leaves by Eliot Hodgkin. Dated 13.IX.55. Realistic, botanical treatment.
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Whatters2 @whatters2.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
Artist: stevesandersonart on Instagram
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ABCtales @abctales.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
This wonderful poem from Angusfolklore is Tuesday’s Pick of the Day. www.abctales.com/story/angusf... Image source and author: commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Ca... M J Richardson Please share if you can.
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Rachel Deering @racheldeering.bsky.social · 13/09/2026
This arrived on Friday. A very beautiful collection by @annestgwilym.bsky.social which takes us on a vivid and lyrical journey across the seasons; anchored in the natural world and Wales. 👇 www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0HG7ZY1Z4
Photo of cover; pale pink or peach with illustration of pink roses. Contemplation of Roses
Annest Gwilym
Lapwing
BallyhalbertIntroduction to Poetry
After Billy Collins
I ask you to take my poem,
hold it like an opal to the bright eye of the sun, see the colours.
Or clasp it to your ear like a seashell.
I suggest you drop an adder into my poem, watch it slide around the curdle of words.
Or you could walk into the poem's dungeon, try to unpick the locks.
I want you to swim in the river of my poem, see if you can get to shore.
But all you want to do is place my poem in a birdcage, force it to sing its song.
You start by starving it
to find out what it really means.
Annest  Gwilym
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Annest Gwilym @annestgwilym.bsky.social · 11/09/2026
Another delve into some of my older work. This one was a competition winner. The image that inspired it (an emperoro moth) was taken by me. #poetsofbluesky #poetsonbluesky #blueskypoets #poetrycommunity
Last Night I Became an Emperor Moth

I rode through the liquid night,
as a melon-slice moon crested a bank of cloud.
Part of the hush and curve of the universe;
Pleiades above me a diamond cluster ring.
Clothed in starlight, wings powdered,
furry belly glossy and plump.

Left the moor for a jaunt to the seaside,
over towns with flickering lights and strange smells.
Saw the sea corrugated by waves,
tang of salt quickening my senses.
Shimmied and played chase with the ladies,
rested with them on marram grass.

Birdsong ushered in the return of the sun; 
drowsy, went home to sleep in the heather.
There to wait for my lover; my musk strong,
it will draw him from miles. He will come, 
wings taut with blood. Antennae fresh as ferns. 
Owl eyes pulsing with life like coals.
Photograph of an emperor moth.
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marandina @marandina.bsky.social · 11/09/2026
Very happy to receive 'Contemplation of Roses' by @annestgwilym.bsky.social today. Poems to savour. #happybookpost
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marandina @marandina.bsky.social · 11/09/2026
Great day at Edgbaston yesterday #EnglandvPakistan
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Sean McNulty @thispersona.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
Very happy to review Drew Gummerson's wonderful reinterpretation of Kafka. From @sunburntsaints.bsky.social @drewgum.bsky.social seanmcnulty1.wordpress.com/2026/09/10/a...
seanmcnulty1.wordpress.com
A review of Gregor by Drew Gummerson
Of all the esques, Kafkaesque gets bandied about a hell of a lot, doesn’t it? It might even outsell picturesque and grotesque in the global word markets. Pythonesque is still around but doesn’t hav…
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BookWormSat @bookwormsat.bsky.social · 11/09/2026
‘Of the West the factory chimneys on sullen sentry will all night wait To call, in the harsh morning, sleep-stupid faces through the daily gate.’ ~ Louis MacNeice To mark the birthdate of MacNeice, #BookWormSat will explore the urban landscape in literature tomorrow. Do join us. 🏙️
Lowry, 1943, Going to work, painting, urban landscape of people going to work in a factory in a city scene.
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Annest Gwilym @annestgwilym.bsky.social · 09/09/2026
An older poem of mine from my first book Surfacing, published by Lapwing Publications. First published in The Dawntreader. Just looking at how my poetry has changed over the years. #poetsofbluesky #poetsonbluesky #poetrycommunity #blueskypoets
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Annest Gwilym @annestgwilym.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
A poem about early autumn from my new poetry book Contemplation of Roses, published by Lapwing Publications. First published in Reach Poetry. Available from: www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0HG7ZY1Z4 #poetrycommunity #poetsofbluesky #poetsonbluesky #blueskypoets
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ABCtales @abctales.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
An intriguing start of something bigger? Sean mcnulty’s ‘The Murder of the Lord Mayor of’ is today’s Pick of the Day www.abctales.com/story/sean-m... Please share if you can.
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Sean McNulty @thispersona.bsky.social · 05/09/2026
Story: The Murder of the Lord Mayor of www.abctales.com/story/sean-m... Political heroes, mistaken identity, and parasol patents
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Rachel Deering @racheldeering.bsky.social · 05/09/2026
‘I thought I heard a voice cry, ‘Jane! Jane! Jane!’ and it was the voice of Edward Fairfax Rochester; and it spoke in pain and woe, wildly, eerily, urgently. I am coming! I cried. Wait for me! Oh, I will come! And I flew to his arms as an angel of deliverance.’ ~ JE, Charlotte Brontë. #BookWormSat
Jane Eyre in rain running over moorland, illustration.
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Annest Gwilym @annestgwilym.bsky.social · 05/09/2026
My four poetry books, 2018-26. Contemplation of Roses and Seasons in the Sun are available from Amazon. The older ones - Surfacing and What the Owl Taught Me are available as PDFs (contact the publisher Lapwing Publications). Contemplation of Roses is available from: www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0HG7ZY1Z4
Image of four poetry books, by Annest Gwilym.
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BookWormSat @bookwormsat.bsky.social · 05/09/2026
‘It does not do to leave a live dragon out of your calculations, if you live near him.’ ~ Tolkien, The Hobbit. @racheldeering.bsky.social here for #BookWormSat today and #ReadABookDay tomorrow. 🖼️ Tolkien, 1937.
Painting of the dragon Smaug resting on a massive pile of gold inside the Lonely Mountain, facing Bilbo Baggins (visible in the small inset at the bottom right).
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marandina @marandina.bsky.social · 05/09/2026
@racheldeering.bsky.social Morning! *brings tea*
static.klipy.com
Pouring Tea with an Ornate Teapot
ALT: Pouring Tea with an Ornate Teapot
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marandina @marandina.bsky.social · 05/09/2026
Happy #Caturday
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Annest Gwilym @annestgwilym.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
Thank you so much Paul @marandina.bsky.social for your thoughtful and perceptive review of my new poetry book Contemplation of Roses which is available from: www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0HG7ZY1Z4 #poetsofbluesky #poetrycommunity #poetsonbluesky #blueskypoets #poetryreviews
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marandina @marandina.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
My review of 'A Contemplation of Roses' by @annestgwilym.bsky.social www.amazon.co.uk/review/RCA16...
amazon.co.uk
Amazon.co.uk
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BookWormSat @bookwormsat.bsky.social · 04/09/2026
‘To this it must be added, that life in a wig is to a large class of people much more terrifying and impressive than life with its own head of hair.’ ~ Dickens, The Old Curiosity Shop. It’s #ReadABookDay on the 6th so we will be recommending favourite books with a quote for this #BookWormSat 📖
🖼️ The Reader, Harold Knight, c.1910.
Woman with brown hair pinned up into a bun, she wears a green down with gold trim, she is holding a book open as she reads it standing. She stands in front of a bookcase filled with books, there are some jars and small pottery vases on the top shelf, there is a chair in a corner. Painting.
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marandina @marandina.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
My latest poem: 'The Call of the Night' Creature comforts www.abctales.com/story/marand...
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Juliet Wilson (Crafty Green Poet) @craftygreenpoet.bsky.social · 02/09/2026
I just reviewed Contemplation of Roses, the latest poetry collection from Annest Gwilym (@annestgwilym.bsky.social) craftygreenpoet.blogspot.com/2026/09/cont...
craftygreenpoet.blogspot.com
Contemplation of Roses by Annest Gwilym
Contemplation of Roses is the latest collection from Welsh poet Annest Gwilym. The opening poem Spring ends:   'birds are loud / in trees ...
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Wyrd Wednesday @wyrdwednesday.bsky.social · 01/09/2026
Wyrdlings! Leaves turn brown, fogs rise in the morning and yes, it’s true, it’s only: “59 Days until Halloween!” So this #WyrdWednesday, come, sit and tell us all things autumnally strange and spooky in wyrd anticipation!
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Rachel Deering @racheldeering.bsky.social · 01/09/2026
Some great and well deserved endorsements for this wonderful new collection. 👇 Do buy or at please share the post.
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ABCtales @abctales.bsky.social · 01/09/2026
Where philosophy meets fantasy – there’s whimsy and sadness in this poem from Jennifer. ‘If (Just a Fantasy)’ is today’s Pick of the Day. www.abctales.com/story/jennif... Please share if you can.
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darkwinterlitmag @darkwinterlitmag.bsky.social · 01/09/2026
Submissions to the literary magazine are now open from September 1st to 31st. Get your poetry and short fiction in now! www.darkwinterlit.com/submit-liter...
darkwinterlit.com
Submit to the Literary Magazine | DarkWinter Literary Magazine
Submit short fiction or poetry to DarkWinter Literary Magazine. We want your weird, your traditional with a twist, your humour, your dark thoughts, or your elation. We’re open to anything—just make it...
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Annest Gwilym @annestgwilym.bsky.social · 31/08/2026
Review of my new book Contemplation of Roses by the talented @racheldeering (Rachel Deering). Published by Lapwing Publications. Image of Cwm Idwal, Snowdonia (Wales) taken by my niece Isabella. My book is available from: www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0HG7ZY1Z4 #poetrycommunity #poetsofbluesky
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marandina @marandina.bsky.social · 31/08/2026
@racheldeering.bsky.social Morning! Happy Bank Holiday Monday! *brings tea*
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