SÉIDEANN AN GHAOTH
Le/By Liam Carson
madadh leis féin
i gcroílár na hinse
séideann an ghaoth
lone dog
in the heart of the island
the wind blows
pléascadh
ón tseanbhalla liath
scornlus corcra
bursting
from the old gray wall
purple scornlus
camóg ar an uisce
dobharchú i bhfolach
i ndorchadas na habhann
ripple on the water
an otter hiding
in the river’s darkness
londubh buí
i measc na gcrann
séideann an ghaoth
blackbird
amidst the trees
the wind blows
Liam Carson is the founder and director of the IMRAM Irish Language Literature Festival, which stages multi-media literary productions that fuse poetry, prose, visual art and music to promote writing in Irish. He is the author of the critically acclaimed memoir ‘Call mother a lonely field,’ shortlisted for the RSL Ondaatje Prize in 2013. He is a haiku poet, and his work has appeared in a wide range of publications, including Autumn Moon Journal, First Frost, hedgerow: a journal of small poems, The Irish Times, Poetry Ireland Review, Presence, Seashores, Tiny Words, and Wales Haiku Journal.
His first haiku collection, Belfast Twilight, has just been published by Salmon Poetry.
Thoreau Spring
by Hugh Curran
Above the rock-slide near Thoreau Spring
Are stone offerings on a cairn; clouds brawled
In filaments of mist billowing from
Scrubbing boards and a mother
Fiercely rubbing the long night’s stain;
From middle age I invoked damp winter
Days hanging frozen in sheets and trousers
Above a stove, and a mother’s wrinkled sighs
Patting migrant bruises, her long corridor
Of convalescence compressing anxiety
To fingertips that traced ladders of stitches
From chin to throat to breast;
Speaking an antique language
That rose and fell in a reverie of sighs,
She brought forth from the stiff line
Of northern sun, curses for the ironing board,
Her discontent falling upon my phantom lap;
In updrafts of memory I swallowed
Her restlessness, watching evening steam
rise from a thread of river to sift the pine
and fir on sweatered hillsides;
Behind the Knife Edge the sun began
Its descent as I retraced my way
Down the rock-strewn path.
Hugh Curran was born in Killybegs, Donegal. He emigrated to Canada with his family. He has taught at the University of Maine for several decades.
Oileán na Marbh
le/with Breda Joyce
Carrickfinn, Dún na nGall
Bhí an taoide amuigh um mhean oíche
is shiúil sé go tromchosach
chomh fada leis an oileán uaigneach.
Bhí corp a linbhín bhig í mbosca bróg
idir lámha aige, sluasaid í mála ar a dhrom
is ualach trom ina chroí.
Sheas mathair an leanbh, croí-bhriste,
ar lag trá ag breathnú amach ar an oileán,
a deora ag titim, a lámha ag crith.
Ní raibh cead aici bheith ann
nuair a cuireadh a naíonán sa talamh
nuair a leagadh sa chré fuar é.
D’fhan sí ina haonar
go dtí casadh na taoide.
Éist leis an dán anseo/Listen to the poem here:
An Island Grave
Carrickfinn, Donegal
At midnight the tide was at its lowest
and he walked heavy-footed
out as far as the lonely island.
In a shoe box his hands carried
the body of his infant child,
his rucksack, a spade and his heart
a heavy burden.
The child’s mother stood there
heartbroken, looking out at the island
as the tide ebbed away,
her tears falling, hands shaking.
She wasn’t allowed to be there
when he buried their child
when he laid him on cold clay.
She stood there, alone,
until the tide turned.
Tógadh Breda Joyce i gCo na Gaillimhe agus mhúin sí i gCo Thiobraid Árainn. Tá a cuid filíochta foilsíthe in Iris leabhair éagsúla. Foilsíodh a céad cnuasach ‘Reshaping the Light’ le gairid, le Chaffinch Press.
Breda Joyce grew up in Co Galway and taught in Co Tipperary. Her poetry is published in various anthologies. Her first collection ‘Rehaping the Light’ is just published by Chaffinch Press.
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Tinteán 