Cormac Culkeen is a writer of poetry, fiction and short stories. He lives and works in Galway and is currently completing a BA Connect in Creative Writing in NUI Galway, returning to university full time as a mature student in 2018. His written work has been published in The Burning Bush, Skylight 47 and The Wild Word poetry magazines. He believes that writing should knock the air from a reader's lungs, give them something to go into the world with or sit in their head like a waiting spider. Sometimes all three. Introduction My aim in writing poems has always been to try and understand. Their meanings are hinted at, presented, not stated. Let’s face it, being alive is a complicated business. Nobody knows what it’s about, really, and the art of poetry is to help us see. So in seeing, what are these poems about? They’re about growing up, about life in the West of Ireland. Mostly they’re about snatched moments, something seen in a glimpse, or recognizing the beautiful everyday that’s there if we’d only notice it. Sometimes they might be concerned with where we’re going. Sometimes they’re raging or casting back to the past with a sad eye. My hope is that they give something to whoever reads them.