Category: Poems

 

I fill my poems

With the rhythm of the river

The music of the Eternal Giver

I can stand long and long

Watching a thrush coax a blackbird

Into song.

 

I met her on an April day

Walking by the canal

Early summer burst my senses

Lock water hurrying to be still

A bee surveying his patch

Swallow Home from Egypt

A lark breaking his winter silence

 

And she is worried about a  abroken gate

On the evening of the 9^th August 2006 My wife Kate and I took a walk along the beach at Seafield near Quilty in County Clare. We were visiting our relations. Kate walked on quickly leaving me to saunter. It was a clear evening and the sun was going down over Mutton Island. The first line of the poem came into my mind. I wrote it down and decided to follow it.

The lines carried on till I got to the fourth and I stopped and I could clearly see my mother in my mind. After this the poem took on a different flow and sentence after sentence came down. The poem took ten minutes to write. When I got to the sun going down, I looked behind me and the moon in all its fullness came up and I saw this as the natural ending.

Afterwards I worked on the lines and began to strengthen them but only succeeded in making a mess. I went back to the original and here it is:

 

She lived among the wild flowers

 

 

She lived among the wild flowers

Where cattle graze

And corncrake rasped the stillness

And by the sea she walked

Where the waves made furrows on her mind

She danced at the crossroads

To the sound of flute and fiddle

And her voice chanted the beauty of her place

Her spirit was free

And like the flocks of goldfinches

Moved with the melody

Her passion was for desolate places

Where alone she was never alone

 

Then one day he came

And she went with him

To an alien place

Into fields of strangers

And there she lived

And there she died

But her soul was always in that hallowed place

Where cuckoo romanced the bog

Calling his name over and over

Where the waves made music on the rocks

And the sun went down over Mutton Island

And the moon came up in full

To serenade the night

An otter floated up the canal.

Its nose parting the water.

Rolled itself into a playful mood

Relaxed into a soft backstroke

Within a second,

Pandemonium,

Waterhens came from everywhere,

Ducks gathered around him,

Shouting and flapping their wings,

He quickly surveyed the scene.

And made a quick turn

Leaving the water in a hurried silence.

Blackbird singing in Basin Street

 

Blackbird singing in Basin Street.

Evening kisses the day

Lamp outside is the setting sun

Light steals the night away

 

All around our little house

That means so much to me

Whispers of a misty evening

Romancing the gentle tree

 

Let us celebrate each moment.

As stars multiply in the sky

And evening melts into timelessness

There is no such word as why

Now I murmur sweet nothingness.

As snowdrops lay in flower

For all I have, I give to you

From now until my final hour.

I watched the moon

Walking down the avenue

Through an acre of birds

Asleep and dreaming

I empty my mind of figures

And fill it with prayers

I walk the avenue

Guarded by the chestnut

with little Christmas trees

Walk over golden leaves

That would outdo Solomon

loop

Nothing but crows

Blackening the light

Squawking terror into the still

Multitudes on the rampage

Dark is everywhere

Nothing is beautiful

But I found a flower in the graveyard

And I saw ducks dance on the water.

 

And there they are

In mourning

Silent

Just floating on the canal

Following the father

At the head of the family

She is gone

Taken out

Murdered

Nobody will say

Somebody knows

The canal has lost its beauty

And for me

A great friend.

There is no moment like this

When my spirit roams

Through falling leaves

Filling me with redemption

The word is passed on

I walk in quiet pastures

By the canal

Where yester days leaves

Have gently turned yellow

A swaying branch deserted

By a fleeing hawk

And I am left in silence