Pat J Mullan. Born in rural north Derry, Pat now lives in Co Kildare. His short stories have been published in Spontaneity, The Galway Review, Paper Swans, Lagan-on-Line, The Incubator, Deep Water Literary Review, Honest Ulsterman, The Bangor Literary Journal, Word Bohemia, Idle Ink, and Shorterstories.ie. He was shortlisted for the Francis McManus Short Story Competition in 2015 and won second prize in the Kildare Junefest Poetry Competition in 2023. In 2004 He self-published a collection of short stories and poetry – “Tales From Derry, Kildare and Beyond,” with all proceeds going to Jach & Jill and Foyle Hospice.

Bring back the dark

By Pat J Mullan

You’d hear a lot of talk about the merits of natural light.

But very little about natural darkness. Darkness is a thing of the past that governments and county councils and the onward march of civilisation has done away with. All in the course of our lifetime. Under our watch.

Street lights, motorway lights, car lights, aircraft lights, traffic lights, car reversing lights. In our homes, bedside lamps, standing lamps, baby lights, head lights, Christmas lights, and reading lamps, TV Rays. Ceiling lights, cooker hood lights, green smoke alarm lights, mobile phone lights – all new developments. Bigger and better and brighter. Outside PIR lights, garden lights. Flood lights. Light pollution.

The dark has retreated to remote hillsides away from towns, villages, roads, motorways, houses and away from humans. Rapidly conceding territory until the inevitable day when it disappears completely from our lives for good.

Blackout blinds are not the answer. Bring back the Tilley lamp, I say, and bring back our darkness before it’s lost for ever to electricity and batteries, even if it is fossil-fuelled.

Bring back natural light and natural darkness in equal measure, to bring balance back into to our lives.