Steering by the Stars

Castaways

An old photograph
shown again at their jubilee,
taken of them off the floor
in the Galtymore:
just met dancers on the wing
gliding out on a 'will you? 
then enthralled under a crystal ball
rotating overhead,
swept along in the kaleidoscope of colours
flying like confetti; 
stepping off the merry go round, 
to an adventure on an island of their making, 
two castaways
in the mineral bar seated side by side, 
his arm around her; 
lit up cigarettes drooping from their fingers
in parallel lines drifting smoke:
lazily longing hands closing in
on what they had just begun to sense
on a night a long time ago in London.

Washed in the Waves

Musing on the short calendar bridge
between November and December,

when our swarm of bees are sleeping
deep down in a seldom-used chimney,

I drag the dead branches I've cut off
overhanging trees around the house
this evening with my new Bushman.

Beneath, the silent river of our fears  
carrying on its back our Covid cares

on its way to sea with twenty twenty
to dump it in the mountainous waves,

and return back as twenty twenty one,
washed clean clear of the killer virus;

bearing promises of a Spring to come
and freeing us to find ourselves again. 

The Singing Woods

The Singing Woods

Slipping 
on to a motorway
you are challenged
by a charging elephant - 
an unyielding juggernaut
terrorising you.

Surviving – just about,
driving on, on track,
easing away, onwards.

Words
throwing you a lifeline -
hauling you away
from the brink.

Settling 
into cruise mode:
gathering at will
the gifts unpaid, unaided,
words
that drop into your head
seductive and insistent,
waiting on you to work,
to be yours:
words
that spring up
in your singing woods.

Falling metaphors
in the light
filtering through.

Winterman

I do not like you Winterman,
walking slowly towards me
with your long black coat
brushing against the bushes,
black as well this evening.
It's your fault you old timer,
you stole the leaves of gold
and sent the sun to bed early,
donning your broad grey hat
for Halloween above us all;
driving the grey road ribbon,
leaving Abbeyfeale behind,
headlights on at half past five
against your onward march -
dipping downhill to Duagh
through descending darkness,
ever trying to creep over me;
a rising string of street lights
up the glenside football village,
each orange glow, my beacon.

Earth to Earth

Soft Trap

A Painted Lady butterfly
Delays delicately nearby,
Her freshness never old.

Wings of words unspoken,
I'm weightless in her space.

Then a ripe red apple falls
With a faint silent sob,
Soft trapping me in sunshine

In the orchard by the stream.

At last I have to walk away
But I leave my pain behind me
Where quietly clamour now
The sniping stinging wasps.

Late Night Taxi

In the still night
I surface
From the dreamy depths;
There is a diesel drone
That plays upon my brain:
A taxi from the town
Bringing home
A small-time punter,
Elegant even at this hour;
Punch drunk from winning
At the races today.

In town tonight
Winners and losers were alright.

Heels in the hall,
A sound so safe:
A welcome noise in the night.
As she beelines to her bed
Her taxi turns and fades away.

Falling Apples

Stepping Away

Using pints for punctuation,
Farming friends around him,
Holding earthy conversations:
Man to man discussions
On someone's lock of cattle
Or a lovely score of lambs.

Turning his back to the bar,
Measuring his every step,
He employs a walking stick

To aid his disappearance;
Exiting black swing doors,
Writing off another night.

In good humour going home,
Unconscious of the loneliness
Of the silent sleeping village,
He sits into my waiting car
And we leave the streetlamps
To the phantoms of the night.

Always Eighteen

The clearness of a dream
I had in bed last night
Has dimmed at dawn-
I'm awake and looking west,
Its dialogue in a deep sleep
Now almost vanished
In the wash of awakening.

In the dream, so real I swear,
She appeared:

Into my head as I slept she crept:
Always eighteen.
As lovely as I left her
At her father's hearth
And said our last goodbyes
To all the years of my unspoken love.
Love's Labour- I began to say,
(Speaking of the title of a play)
But there she stopped me
In my mid line

To finish it herself this time:
'Love's Labour- is never- Lost'

Contradicting
Both Shakespeare and myself.
That was the only thing she said
As with the dream she left my bed.

Droving

High Tide

White light of rain
On ash trees green and gold,
Roses red and wild beneath.
Thoughts on death but time for life,
I hear the cry of a child.

Galway shops were busy.
Not so everyone -
There was a man
Who stood alone
Observing.

Thoughts on family things;
Crying of the wind -
But love beats loneliness.

On a pencil hill
Miles away
Our house looks out
With vacant stare
On Kerry North -
My destiny to the sea.

The tide tonight
Was glued to Oranmore,
In the fullness of its savagery -
Always raw even in July.

Aromas

Because I learned my lessons by lamplight,
The scent of parrafin sealing my family love
Forever in my senses,
You too can learn in love
From books and incense;
Candles so coloured on your windowsill
Against the black of night.