The Magpie Child

By Lauren Wesley-Smith

The magpie child doesn’t care for plastic, flashing bulbs or trendy toys. 

In a wooden box beneath the bed, they store the garnered treasures.

Multi-colored twine, frayed at either end

A pink hued rock and shard of sea green glass

A book-pressed leaf, bared to its brown skeleton

A stray marble, glittering like a galaxy

A glass gem, fallen from a favourite bracelet

An old wine cork, just for the smell.

Nothing but junk, says the grownup.

But to the magpie child, in every stick and every stone,

Glints the light of primal magic.

Parental Prestidigitation

By Séimí Mac Aindreasa

Liam watches wearily as the large hand moves towards him.

The hand, trusted, moves with the slow steadiness of a benign cobra.

He fights back a laugh, as familiar feelings of trepidation and anxiety

mix with the anticipation of imminent, impossible magic.

Closer.

Closer.

Hand touches face. Liam feels the slight pressure; warm, soft; coffee and baby powder.

The hand retreats.

As it swims back into focus, Liam stares in cross-eyed awe. Surely this is the greatest thing? The trick of tricks?

But there it is, plain to see: Liam’s nose, stolen once again.

The secret wish list of an exiled Dragon Rider on his 7th Birthday

By Lizzie Hills

His cake:  fashioned on a steam train, engineered industrial cream, glazed wheels. Seven candles standing guard. 

Another year, without him.

Transfixed by the seven candles, his mum vanished into Wicca worlds, her fortress. 

Sylvester commanded, “make a wish!” He considered conjuring blue, stray dogs, with monkey tails or streetwise macaws with crooked crocodile teeth. A wish list of fantastical, hybrid beasts. 

With his patronus, a dragon named Sylvester, they flew through liquorice rainforests, treacle Savannahs. 

Together they evaded rogue wizards, on their quest to bring him home. 

He made his wish: a homecoming spell, no more exiled Birthdays, without him.

The Tower

By Bean Sawyer

I see you. Then I don't.

Time has hidden you beneath a mossy quilt. Has lifted your strong stones and placed them on the ground; stole your leaded windows and wooden staircase and wrapped you in an ivy shroud. 

I see you. Then I don't.

The shape of you fits here with the creaking trees and pine cones. On the boggy path where frogs spawn and crows fly sentinel. 

I see you. When you want me to.

Inside your walls and hollow roof. I feel the warmth of your abandoned fireplace; hear the whispered words of long ago.

Granny Ivy

By Erica Ward

Dad called his mother-in-law the Wicked Welsh Witch of the West. I defended her passionately, not recognising the affectionately cheeky nickname. She didn’t wave a wand or fly a broomstick, but her hugs were magical, conveying the joy of togetherness after months apart. The summer holidays flew as we wandered sun-baked cliff paths and played “the waves can’t get me.” Always over too soon, tears tumbling as we drove away, waving goodbye. She cast her magic into the ether when she left this earthly life, and on precious nights I catch the spell as I dream, and we’re together again.

How the spider ballet was lost 

By Marie-Louise McGuinness

Jacob flourished in the spotlight, his opalescent eyes glittered, despite the long shadows of his conical, wide-brimmed hat. With flared sleeves rolled up, his stubby fingers deftly swished a plastic wand towards his pound-store tricks.

Behind the curtain, Julie focused on a spider scuttling past her feet. She willed it up from the floor, where, suspended without webs, she twirled it's spiky legs around in a dance worthy of any professional ballet.

With the loud scraping of chairs and rapturous applause, the spider fell, lost forever to Jacob’s thundering praise. Angry tears gushing, Julie cursed the magic that Jacob possessed.

The waning magic of older rabbits

By Judith Wilson

The bright coloured handkerchiefs offer the perfect bed for mindfulness as Robbie prepares for his retirement show. 

Preening in front of the mirror he runs his paws across his wrinkled face and greying fur and closes his mouth on his missing teeth. 

Pushing past the young, starry-eyed rabbit in the wings, he jumps into the top hat for one last appearance.

Indifferent applause leaves him empty. 

And when the Magician places him in a rabbit-sized box and picks up a sharp, shiny saw, Robbie knows this isn’t just retirement. 

Now he understands why he’s never met any of his predecessors.

The Witch’s Feast

By Bethan Charles

They talked of flames licking my feet, consuming my body, as though the fire thought me a delectable feast. Maybe it did. Perhaps it burnt with a fury never seen to show gratitude to my accusers for serving such a delicious treat. They refused to quench my smouldering remains. A warning, they said, for women (always women) to resist the temptations of demons. They surrounded my ashes with stars carved into wood to contain my supposed evil spirit. The fools. My embers caught the wind, buried in their thatched roofs, and feasted.

Walnut Shells

By Robert Burns

Maddie strained on tippy-toes to see over the edge of the folding table, tracking the walnut shells whizzing by her nose.

Onlookers marveled at each mesmerizing flick of Lorenzo’s supple wrists until, finally, his talented hands came to rest on the table.

The magician bent nearly in half to query his tiny observer, “Well, my dear? Can you find the pea?”

Beaming, Maddie stretched her chubby arm full length so she could touch the middle shell.

Lorenzo smiled inwardly as he surreptitiously placed the pea.

“Voila!” he exclaimed, lifting the shell with a flourish. “You did it, little one!”

Ophelia

By Jonathan Braunstein

Ophelia emerged on a warm spring’s eve when dew dropped from the leaves of a newborn maple. 

From springtime through summer, she scattered fairy dust, causing the flowers to bloom, never pausing to rest. 

In autumn’s cooling, she transformed the greens into yellows and reds, then tired when cold winter winds beckoned.

She flew down to Riverfolk. There, she nestled within the fallen leaves with the kiss of slumber.

When spring returned, she awakened with enough magic for one more pleasure. Sparking with joy, she burst into dust.

In her place a maple tree sprouted, its leaves bejeweled with dew.