It's had its season this

It's had its season this.

It's had its season this,

These borrowed days

Their gifts, teased out

Among the strands.

It's had its season this,

The covered ways

And rifts, that ripple

Down the ebb and flow

Of chance.

It's had its season this,

Its shaded greys

And drifts, the colours

On the carousel.

It's had its season this,

Its plays and shifts.

Dead pennies, yes,

It's had its season this.

Photograph: A view from the old graveyard

Hill of Skryne, looking toward

Tara. Summer 2008.

The Quest

The Quest

A wheel of fortune's

Circle trace

The reason why

Made subject to

This place,

The ages spent

Along the way.

The empires

Crumbling into dust

Their form to

Disarray.

The congretations

Winding down

Past columns wound

Soul purpose

To their quest.

While shadows

Danced

To covens round

And rule of thumb

Their guest

Made light of it,

And played till

You know everything.

Photograph: Bridge/The Ramparts

Navan. Spring 2008.

Discovery

A few poems about discovery

and such things?

Discovery

Damn these maps

their safe harbours.

This watch for yesterday.

Quartered and halved

as the wind dictates.

All talk these

arguements they plot.

Like hungry ghosts

that pitch and roll

their contradictions,

till they fall off

the earth.

They will lose

themselves.

Here be Dragons!

Photograph: The sea at Spanish Point.

Co. Clare. 1996.

Manoeuvers

Manoeuvers

All that spit

And polish

Bulling

Usual drills.

Old school ties

Talking up a storm,

The throwback,

Clinical smiles

The shades.

Catch you around

Sometime

The fine line

Sloping away,

Trailing arms

And coat tails

The official stamp.

Enough is enough.

Photograph: The River Boyne

Ramparts/Navan

Spring 2008.

Canon

Canon

Dot the commas

Cross the square

Murky as

An inkwell there.

Out beyond

The railroad tracks

They're pulling rabbits

Out of sacks.

Waiting for

Your guard to slip

And then they'll get

Another grip.

Moulding numbers

Into place

From arguements

In civic space.

They never miss

A single trick

The corporals and

Their walking sticks.

Photograph: Famine memorial

People's park.

Kells Co. Meath.

Summer 2007.

Comrades in Arms

Comrades in Arms


Nature playing the role
Of some devil may care
Dressed up for some other
Non local affair
With destiny settled
For certainty those
Who chose to accept
The conditions imposed
And practiced his art
With such consummate skill
That he only just made it
With time left to kill.

Photograph: Plaque outside
ledwidge Cottage
Slane County Meath.
Summer 2007.

Carpetbags

Carpetbags

Carpetbags

are different now.

Only a few loose ends

and the colours change.

In the marketplace

it's all up for grabs.

Dealers holding

a watching brief,

and the new order's in

hawking its wares.

Attache cases.

And the rules the same,

buy cheap, sell dear,

and no compartment now

for missing files,

not like the old ones.

Everything carefully stitched

except a few pockets

of resistance

taking a morality cheque

just for the present.

And everyone's waiting

for a White Christmas.

Photograph: Homeplace of Francis Ledwidge

Slane Co.Meath. Born 1887

Died France 1917.