The fascinating world of whitethorn: its diverse names, folklore and myths, its significance in beekeeping.common names include hawthorn, May bush, fairy tree, and quick thorn. Continue reading
Filed under environment …
Ireland in the 1980s and Today
According to the United Nations Human Development Index, Irish people enjoy the second-highest quality of life worldwide, and the country is ranked 12th in the 2024 Social Progress Index. Continue reading
Eamonn Wall: transatlantic poet part two
Much commemorated in literature and music, the 1798 legend lives on in the town because the geography and townscape have changed little. Wall walks the same trails meandering alongside the Slaney. That is his Enniscorthy, a place of enduring pain, and ancient prayer represented here by his poem, ‘Night Heron’ Continue reading
Community Gatherings in Ireland Old and New part one
. To this day, we have a saying in Irish ‘Bhí togha gacha bí agus rogha gacha dí le fail ann’, The finest of every food and the choice(st) of every drink was to be had there. This is believed to originally date from bards of one to two thousand years ago. As a chieftain or king, one’s reputation had to be maintained, or enhanced and these ‘songs of praise’, so to speak, were pivotal in this regard. Continue reading
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November rain in Dublin
by Michael Patrick Moore ‘Come here to me, let me tell ya, don’t the living be busy today?’comings and goings on Graftonand on Merrion; where the craic is good,O’Donaghues is full. There are footsteps on quay, bridge and streettapping away like rain on tin,all servants of masters with somewhere to be or someone to meetand … Continue reading
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Seasonal Poems
Vermeer would have made much of it Continue reading
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Snow in Alberta, Canada
The sun slips behind the black silhouettes of the Rockies.
Fingers and ears chill with disturbing speed.
Faster than in an Irish winter dusk. Continue reading
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Poems by David Harris
Today, on our morning swim together.
I watch her dive, hair streaming,
at home among the waves…
You won’t find these in the bush.
Thistles, nettles, tumbleweed,
three-cornered jacks, horehound, Continue reading
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Duffy House
Named for the original builders, it is a public acknowledgement of the part played by the Irish in early Perth Continue reading
A DAY ON SKELLIG ROCK
Skellig really is a magical place. Continue reading