When all the world was young

            Oh for the days of childhood, when the sun was always in the sky, ice-creams came in wafers, we skated on the pond all winter long, men whistled on the way to work, Christmases were  knee-deep in snow and the neighbours invited you in for orange squash and bikkies. Nightime was curl up cosy in front of the blazing turf fire. Oh dear, if only!               

 

 

 

                            Eleven

 

          I am eleven;

my eyes are overflowing with light

from the spangling stream,

ears brimming with its chattering

sprays and runs,

my back lush with the magnificence 

of  Summer sun. 

 

I am in a field of cowslips,

the colour butter ought to be;

in the distance a bell is chiming

but I have no duties.

I’m lying on my stomach on a wooden bridge,

my eyelids shut, my fingers fishing for splinters.

 

The Wind Claps The Slates.

 

 

The wind claps the slates;

all night they are hooves running berserk,

all night the wind is inciting them;

all night.

 

At twenty past two and twenty past three

and twenty past four I am looking at you;

how I would love to have hooves to come

crashing through your sleep, to burst into

your solitude.

 

And there I would, for better or worse,

demolish the muzzled years with as much

violence as reverberates beneath iron shoes,

as  causes such a frenzy in stone that slates

stampede.

from Painting Women

 

 

 

 

Her skin is clear and white (as I see it);

he picks out the heat and cold

that is in her flesh

so her belly is blue and green;

colours I have seen

where rubbish stirs in low tide.

She is a timber frame

a thousand colours.

They are inside each other

wash in and out of each other;

overlapping, under-lapping.

They graze on each other;

slap, fall, meld, hide,

shimmer, swelter, drown;

no rules until completion.

The brush, searching for challenges,

rushes about the page putting out fires

anxious for a thousand perfections

Stone: Christian and Pre-christian

Whether it be the ruined castles or celtic crosses, megalithic dolmens or round towers,  Ireland's greatest treasures are made of stone. To my mind, they are at their most beautiful when you come upon them expectedly: unsign-posted, undeveloped. And yet we need them as part of our tourism. It's an old bone of contention now, but I would go for heritage centres  away from these sites. I'd go for centres in local towns that highlight what's in the district, supply maps, information, lore.

If there must be development at the site, I'd go for small; not overwhelming. Carrowmore neolithic cemetery ( 6000 to 3000 BC) in Sligo is a case of the latter; the centre is modest, allowing the megalithic remains their space on the landscape.

St Patrick's Well at Oran, Co Roscommon would be passed in the blink of an eye as one drives around a bend on a road. The remains of the nearby round tower is the only evidence of its ancient importance. The unexpected discovery of the round tower added hugely to the pleasure of seeing the well. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

                                           St Patrick's Well at Oran, Co. Roscommon

St Patrick's Well at Oran, Co. Roscommon

 

Megalithic Tomb inside Cairn at Carrowmore, Sligo

City Lives

 

City Lives.

They shout into space,

answer each other like whales

across great haunted distances;

they never meet,

only sound waves ever meet.

  

Alone in their canyons,

hives,

shoals

they roar.

Rooms upon rooms

upon houses upon houses

upon streets upon streets:

roars spilling out,

spilling over,

spilling down.

 

A million sound waves,

a million discordancies

tumbling, surging, 

pouring out

onto the streets,

into the traffic,

wheels, cogs, pistons:

 

that cannibal jazz

of cities.

 

New or Old Religion

Old religion it may be, but worship of the goddess of the earth ensured that earth was not defiled. Ecology for pre-science days; the planet would be in a be in a far healthier state if those beliefs still prevailed.

 

Clay in her mouth,

clothed in darkness, caged in stone.  

She speaks in

the crumbling of mountains,

creeping of oceans across continents. 

When she pauses,

earthworms devour boulders.

All the beautiful days

"All the beautiful days,

 all the beautiful days...." 

And he died

with all the beautiful days

like a wishbone in his throat. 

Two passers-by stopped and looked: 

How did his eyes become like that?

They became bleached blue with liquor madness. 

How did his face get so torn up?

He often fell but was not dead. 

And old, why is he so old?

Because he fought with every single day,

and each day's victory was notched into his face.

 

                                                                           from Sunfire (Dedalus Press, 97)

Tonight I Nearly Died

Tonight I Nearly Died.

 

Tonight I nearly died

in the Sunday chain

returning to Dublin.

A scythe

arched onto the road.

As I rushed

I nearly overtook life. 

What did I learn? 

My eyes are good

dilated in horror.

 
                                                              from Sunfire (Dedalus Press, 1997)

A Moment Certified By Lovers

A Moment Certified By Lovers.

 

It's a certifiable moment

a punch-drunk second

a pulse's high tide.

 

A dog eats grass

a water drop shivers

a barrel fills to its brim

an apple falls 
a body drifts 

a face buckles

a lover screams.

 

At the tip of an orgasm

passion powders;

the creek turns to dust.

 

 

 

                                           from Sunfire, (Dedalus Press, 1997)

Stone Circle

Eight heads: bald, lichen-stained,
eyes closed, always listening.

One jowl-cheeked, one stub-nosed,
one with an empty eye-socket,
two with ears inclined to the earth,
another with a nasty bump,
one wearing a green skull cap,
the last, his mouth o, standing outside the circle;

all speaking in a pitch
below the range of human audibility.

The Mountain

First I saw a goat, a prehistoric creature with colossal spiralling horns,

coarse matted hair and yellow eyes.

A herd of goats trailing down a gorge

was her hair, ragged streams divining routes down her back,

a cloak of autumn-gold tussocks

with swirls of inlaid bronze bracken blazing in the sun.

Her face was a graphite sheen; eyes: crags in a waterfall,

nose: a darkened  boulder with cold glittering cheeks on either side.

Close by, a rowan’s red mouth was chortling;

a cloud had torn itself to rags escaping the clutches of a hawthorn;

above us hail stones were ripening for a fall.

Left Field Self-Portraits

 

I think the process of writing good poetry is very similar to painting in non-conventional styles, in some ways there is more in common here  than there is with prose-writing. The more radical the approach the more interesting. Here is a selection of self-portraits that stand out; artists that can do these, I think must have that poetry thing. Indeed I think dwelling on any of these for a while might well inspire a poem.

 

 

Schiele in typical Schiele fashion

Francesco Parmigianino's Self Portrait in a Convex Mirror; I love the hand.

Tintoretto seeing himself with rheumy eyes

Dali company-keeping with bacon: Soft Self-Portrait with Fried Bacon

Escher Self-Portrait 1919 Woodcut

 

 Crespi Self-Portrait

 

Courbet (forgot his mobile)

Difficult to decide which Kahlo, but this has some of her trademarks

Francis Bacon looking pensive. 

Goethe's Last Supper

It takes a good writer. I had never registered the hands, not to mention the tiny detail of the knife. Goethe's observation of the detail in 'The Last Supper' is great.

---an excerpt from a piece written by JOHANN WOLFGANG VON GOETHE (from Great Pictures, As Seen and Described by Famous Writers, edited by Esther Singleton, pub. Dodd, Mead and Co., New York, 1899) ---

.........The exciting means which the artist employed to agitate the tranquil and holy Supper-Table are the Master's words: "There is one amongst you that betrays me." The words are spoken, and the entire company falls into consternation; but He inclines His head with downcast looks; the whole attitude, the motion of the arms, the hands, and everything repeat with heavenly resignation which the silence itself confirms, "Verily, verily, there is one amongst you that betrays Me."

Before going any farther we must point out a great expedient, by means of which Leonardo principally animated this picture: it is the motion of the hands; only an Italian would have discovered this. With his nation the whole body is expressive, all the limbs take part in describing an emotion, not only passion but also thought. By various gestures he can express: "What do I care?"—"Come here!"—"This is a rascal, beware of him!" "He shall not live long!" "This is a main point. Take heed of this, my hearers!" To such a national trait, Leonardo, who observed every characteristic with the greatest attention, must have turned his searching eye; in this the present picture is unique and one cannot observe it too much. The expression of every face and every gesture is in perfect harmony, and yet a single glance can take in the unity and the contrast of the limbs rendered so admirably.

The figures on both sides of our Lord may be considered in groups of three, and each group may be regarded as a unit, placed in relation and still held in connection with its neighbours. On Christ's immediate right are John, Judas, and Peter.

Peter, the farthest, on hearing the words of our Lord, rises suddenly, in conformity with his vehement character, behind Judas, who, looking up with terrified countenance, leans over the table, tightly clutching the purse with his right hand, whilst with the left he makes an involuntary nervous motion as if to say: "What may this mean? What is to happen?" Peter, meanwhile, with his left hand has seized the right shoulder of John, who is bending towards him, and points to Christ, at the same time urging the beloved disciple to ask: "Who is the traitor?" He accidentally touches Judas's side with the handle of a knife held in his right hand, which occasions the terrified forward movement upsetting the salt-cellar, so happily brought out. This group may be considered as the one first thought of by the artist; it is the most perfect.

While now on the right hand of the Lord a certain degree of emotion seems to threaten immediate revenge, on the left, the liveliest horror and detestation of the treachery manifest themselves. James the Elder starts back in terror, and with outspread arms gazes transfixed with bowed head, like one who imagines that he already beholds with his eyes what his ears have heard. Thomas appears behind his shoulder, and approaching the Saviour raises the forefinger of his right hand to his forehead. Philip, the third of this group, rounds it off in the most pleasing manner; he has risen, he bends forward towards the Master, lays his hands upon his breast, and says with the greatest clearness: "It is not I, Lord, Thou knowest it! Thou knowest my pure heart, it is not I."

And now the three last figures on this side give us new material for reflection. They are discussing the terrible news. Matthew turns his face eagerly to his two companions on the left, hastily stretching out his hands towards the Master, and thus, by an admirable contrivance of the artist, he is made to connect his own group with the preceding one. Thaddæus shows the utmost surprise, doubt, and suspicion; his left hand rests upon the table, while he has raised the right as if he intended to strike his left hand with the back of his right, a very common action with simple people when some unexpected occurrence leads them to say: "Did I not tell you so? Did I not always suspect it?"—Simon sits at the end of the table with great dignity, and we see his whole figure; he is the oldest of all and wears a garment with rich folds, his face and gesture show that he is troubled and thoughtful but not excited, indeed, scarcely moved.

If we now turn our eyes to the opposite end of the table, we see Bartholomew, who rests on his right foot with the left crossed over it, supporting his inclined body by firmly resting his hands upon the table. He is probably trying to hear what John will ask of the Lord: this whole side appears to be inciting the favourite disciple. James the Younger, standing near and behind Bartholomew, lays his left hand on Peter's shoulder, just as Peter lays his on John's shoulder, but James mildly requests the explanation whilst Peter already threatens vengeance.

And as Peter behind Judas, so James the Younger stretches out his hand behind Andrew, who, as one of the most prominent figures expresses, with his half-raised arms and his hands stretched out directly in front, the fixed horror that has seized him, an attitude occurring but once in this picture, while in other works of less genius and less reflection, it is too often repeated

The Green Road

The blackthorns above Fenore
are flight rooted;
they are folklore’s skeletons,
beggars of the green road.

Scoured to the knuckle,
stunted on burren karst,
they are the hags on the mountain
hunched from Atlantic gales.

Yet even this stone-weary day,
with hunger perched on their throats,
a robin is singing in each
notes that singe the February air.

Beneath the huddling sky,
into the ear of the green road
it pours, clear as water,
the music of tin whistlers’ dreams.

Expressing Depression

 'O the mind, mind has mountains; cliffs of fall/Frightful, sheer, no-man-fathomed'.

These lines cause me to wonder if the search for the appropriate words, and the subsequent expression of one's condition helps to ease the effects of depression. By making a prayer of it, I assume Hopkins was shifting some of the weight towards heaven.


No Worst, there is None.

                                   by Gerard Manley Hopkins

No worst, there is none. Pitched past pitch of grief,

More pangs will, schooled at forepangs, wilder wring.

Comforter, where, where is your comforting?

Mary, mother of us, where is your relief?

My cries heave, herds-long; huddle in a main, a chief

Woe, wórld-sorrow; on an áge-old anvil wince and sing —

Then lull, then leave off. Fury had shrieked "No ling-

ering! Let me be fell: force I must be brief."

    O the mind, mind has mountains; cliffs of fall

Frightful, sheer, no-man-fathomed. Hold them cheap

May who ne’er hung there. Nor does long our small

Durance deal with that steep or deep. Here! creep,

Wretch, under a comfort serves in a whirlwind: all

Life death does end and each day dies with sleep.