The Douglas Hyde Conference 2014

I’m chairing this year’s conference, which takes place on July 18^th in Ballaghaderreen. Entitled ‘The Unsaved Harvest: Rural Ireland’s Cultural Heritage’, it celebrates the richness of rural Ireland’s culture, with talks, discussion, poetry, music  and song. Taking counties from the north midlands and northwest as typical of rural Ireland, it will highlight the greatness of figures such as John McGahern, Oliver Goldsmith,  Douglas Hyde,Turlough O’Carolan, James Coleman, Margaret Cousins and Brian O’Doherty, not just in Irish culture, but world culture.

And it asks the question, are we making enough of this  cultural heritage?  When people travel through Ireland, are they aware that they are passing through the landscapes that inspired some of these towering names.

A great line up of speakers and entertainers including Vincent Woods, Brian Leyden, Catherine Marshall, W.J. McCormack ( aka Hugh Maxton)and  Noel O’Grady among others will bring it all life. A wonderful day is in store.

 

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

All Dublin in your armchair

If ever you plan to go to Dublin, I suggest you make a virtual tour first, and you'll no finer way to wander through the city than by Storymap. Meet the story-tellers, poets and writers: Laurence Foster, Dermot Healy, Noel O'Grady, Paula Meehan and a host of  others. Dubliners and non-Dubliners, hear their voices and their stories; arrive in Dublin with your yap in place.

 So, I give you a gateway to Dublin; step through, and enjoy. http://storymap.ie/  

Irish trad but as you know it

Like the cover design, Ensemble Ériu's music is Irish but not typical; the inclusion of some unorthodox instruments gives it a very fresh sound. It's brilliant. Visit here http://ensembleeriu.com/

 

Ensemble Ériu are

Jack Talty: concertina, electronics

Neil O’ Loghlen: double bass, flute & whistle

Matthew Berrill: Clarinet

Matthew Jacobson: Marimba, Drums

Jeremy Spencer: Fiddle

Úna McGinty: Fiddle, Viola

Paddy Groenland: Guitar

Sam Perkin: Keyboards

Colm O’ Hara: Trombone

Saileog Ní Cheannabháin: Voice

The Rathmines Roar

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

Mick O'Dea, the artist

Mick O'Dea is perhaps best known for his portraits; his 2010 portrait of Brian Friel being a beautiful example of what he does so wonderfully.

But as the YouTube video above shows, he is far more than a portraitist. This will be borne out by a visit to his website, which I strongly recommend.

http://mickodea.carbonmade.com/

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.

 

A poem about something I can hardly explain

This poem is about something I can hardly explain,

our twenty-third year in this house,

the laburnum, again, filling our bedroom window

with its solar brilliance.

We met Graham outside, on the street.

He said “didn’t you hear about Evelyn, (his wife),

we buried her last Saturday.

I looked at your house, you were away.”

I am in bed. My wife,

her arm casually across me, is sleeping.

I am looking at the laburnum;

I look at it like this every year.

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)

Painting Skin

Watching artist, Mick O’Dea, building up the layers of colour that are in skin was a revelation to me.

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 frame for the hanging

of 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.

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)

Face

A face in a window

told me all I needed to know

about age.

The colourlessness, darkness,

confinement. 

A face that stared through me,

that saw or not,

cared not ─

blank as its countenance ─

for all that moved. 

A face

on a north-facing window-sill,

turned outward

for that day

toward the sun on the other side.

 

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)