Smithereens Press Chapbooks Atoll by Dylan Brennan | Page 25

Notes and Acknowledgements

‘Tabula Rasa’, ‘Alicia Rovira Arnaud’, ‘Atoll’, and ‘Lighthouse King’
are inspired by the astonishing history of the inhabitants of Clipperton
Island. ‘Tabula Rasa’ contains a quotation from an ornithological report
by Julian Dodson, who killed all the pigs on the island in order to allow
the Goat’s Foot Morning Glory (Ipomoea pes-caprae) to grow and
shelter crabs and bird eggs. As he left Clipperton, Dodson worried he
may have left a pregnant sow behind.
Thanks are due to the editors of the following publications where a
number of these poems first appeared: Poetry Ireland Review, The
Penny Dreadful, Burning Bush 2, Revival Literary Journal & The New
Binary Press Anthology of Poetry: Volume I.