Saint Féichín's Prayer on High Island *

Between the troubled sea and fickle sky,

this island barely more than raft,

this church a mast,

and you, my Lord, Jesus Christ, the sail

delivering us from monsters

that daily beset us in our voyage.

I strap myself to this stone, consecrated

with your cross and invite my penance:

flails lifted from the swell, nails

You spit to cleanse us.

I present myself, a rag on a thorn,

a cold flame awaiting the warmth of Your forgiveness.


*Saint Féichín founded a monastery on this tiny, remote island off the Galway coast in 634. There are some photographs at  http://www.earlychristianireland.net/Counties/galway/high_island/

Book Launch of 'The Pornographer's Model': Short Stories by Kevin Hora

Looking forward to the launching of Kevin Hora's chapbook, 'The Pornographer's Model', next Thursday, May 2nd, at 6.30pm in Kevin St Library, Dublin . I rate him highly; his stories are imaginative, finely crafted, intriguing. The depth of care taken shines out from his writing; his sharp intelligence is constant and consistent throughout. He is one for the future; I'm recommending you come to see for yourself.

Manet's 'The Railway': another view

A curiosity beyond bars; children are so used to 

bars.

The smoke, not the engine; not the source, but its 

obfuscation.

The wonder that was everything, before the indifference

of adulthood.

Ending, Beginning

Tidying Away

Thirty years of documents, notebooks, letters;

packing myself into a black plastic bag:

the defunct Michael; unfulfilled,

forgotten, abandoned Michael.

The Michael that was clogging up the box room;

I'm fucking him out;

ambitions, cares, memories:  

all of it.

Shelves emptied

to a new tidiness,

a smaller Michael;

space.

Failing Light

In the failing light of a November evening,

kicking through the rotting leaves on a suburban path,

I remember you, digging the garden ridges, shaking out

the groundsel, tossing the stones under the hedge.

Great events in your kingdom were scurryings in the grass,

a thrush feeding on a worm, raindrops falling from the apple trees.

Far from inspectors and reports, you held sway over

the straightening of ridges, regiments of onions and lettuces.

With each passing year, you are buried deeper beneath memory,

becoming ever more intangible, like these rotting leaves

that leave only their scent hanging in the dank November air;

after all this time, you have become more like a book I once read.

Treasure

The sun, smashed on the river, makes a million smithereens.

I lie face down on the bank, make a bowl of my hands and scoop

them up, as I would a shoal of minnows. Then, inspecting

my treasure, I find no diamonds, just a dwindling pool of water.

I shake my hands dry, and promise myself,

“one day, Michael, you will own a house beside water.”

How far up is the blue of the sky?

Even the sky doesn’t know,

but searches inside itself

as the old men with coats and jackets

went searching for letters in pockets

that were around the inside, and sometimes

inside another again. They searched,

and usually searched  in vain.

But the smoke from their pipes

went searching, upward and around,

always curious, prying and thorough

in a desultory sort of way;

heading towards the answer, but

much like the old men themselves,

never having the energy to get there.

Rain as a Mood

  

Right now, rain

is my only jacket;

its soft viciousness,

clamping the throats of songbirds,

stokes my anger.

Fists dug deep into pockets,

knuckles, egg-boned, gagged;

I slump into the pours,

draw its bullets

like food.

Almost not at all

I am almost not at all;

teetering on the brink of invisibility,

incorporeal, and rudderless  on the interface

of a nebulous past, unfathomable future.

Not seeing myself; insubstantial in both worlds;

I am more echo than shout;

a man whose atoms are disbanding;
less,
a dispersal of waves.

Emigration never left

There was a time, maybe thirteen or fourteen years ago when it seemed the country was rid, once and for all, of the sad days of mass emigration. All was lift; then came the collapse. Now, Dublin is vibrant again, but in many rural parts it's the old story of population decline, absence of youth, absence of vigour.

The scene I'm describing seemed like it was becoming less relevant, but unfortunately no.

No People

The hunch-doubled thorns,

ingrown pantries

dung-puddled;

the moss-stone walls

tumble-gapped.

The nettle-cracked doorway,

lintel-fallen

byre-footed;

the cloud curtained windows

elder-berried.

The stone-sheltered air

bumbled still,

ruin-reverent;

the submerged garden ridges

dumb-founded.

Crosses in a snow-covered military cemetery.

These crosses seem to rise from oblivion

and carry oblivion on their shoulders.

In their ranks, each is unaware of the next,

as though the world must teeter on him alone.

And silence is the law, since all around is silent;

each one white as the ground he stands on.

Workshop Tips for Poetry Beginners

1.       Check that details included as factual are accurate.

2.       Check that words you have used do not have unplanned, unhelpful connotations.

3.       Colloquialisms should be used for definite purpose or effect; casually inserted, they often jar.

4.       Use ‘like’ and ‘as’ sparingly e.g. the train crawled out of the station like a caterpillar.

5.       Avoid explaining yourself; imagery or other poetic mechanisms may provide a necessary clarification.

6.       Avoid moralizing.

7.    Beware of lines you really like in your poems; if they are 'stand out' to you, they'll quite possibly unbalance the boat.

8.       Avoid changes of style in a poem, unless there is a specific purpose (e.g. the sudden appearance of rhyme).

9.       Read your poetry out loud to check cadence.

10.   One poor (lazy) line sinks a poem.

11.   Engage with art of all types regularly; poetry is art, artistic taste brushes off on your work.

12.   Compile a list of events/experiences/sights from your past and present life that could spark poetry.

13.   Look at day to day events in terms of their writing potential and take notes.

14.   Create a mood for your creativity with evocative music, images, smells etc.

15.   Poems seldom arrive in finished state; be patient, leave them to sit, and edit them after a reasonable period of cooling off time.

16.   Retain older versions of poems. Rewriting can change the tenor of a piece of work. It may transpire that you have more than one poem among a series of drafts.

17.   Old poems, that have been unsuccessful, can prove excellent sources of lines that, stitched together, recombine into  new and successful poems.
18. Get yourself a critic, who sees the world your way, but knows enough to give informed opinions.

The Lake

The lake sees.

It draws the world’s beauty into itself

and is replete.

I may admire,

but must not dip my hand into the water,

for worry destroys beauty.

Well, my friend

Well, my friend, our time is gone;

you are dead, and I have left that group.

Our friendship was the sole tie,

and it was a friendship, though only you

and I ever knew. The world is a cold place;

our time is passed, and, in truth,

there is nothing to mark our closeness.

I keep it in my head; it is precious to me;

beyond that there is no proof, no evidence;

the memory goes with us, and, I suppose

that is the way it should be.

A happy thought for St Patrick's Day

The weight of these beautiful things:

pool of sunlight among the trees;

scurrying shadows of April clouds;

scintillations on water flashing into my eyes;

brilliance of rime on a January morning footpath;

a blackbird’s notes spilling down;

magnificent blur of a kingfisher’s flight;

smell of lavender, of newly mown hay;

the sound of wind in the telegraph wires,

of children playing in the schoolyard.

The weight of these beautiful things is naught.