For many in Ireland, ‘Around the Boree Log’ was our introduction to Australia. Continue reading
Filed under Poetry …
Sounds Irish: One Hundred Years of Around the Boree Log
Around the Boree Log is more than a source of nostalgia for parlour poetry. It is also a source that provides an insight into the language of Irish Australia in the early twentieth century. Continue reading
Brigid: from Goddess to Saint to Poet
The poem begins with a recognition of the unbroken chain (slabhra) from the celtic Brigid to the abbess who built her own convent in Kildare, to a modern day Brigid taking care of her family, and through to the writer, the poet. Continue reading
A Christmas Sestina by David Harris
Our Christmas Day, the day that Christ was born,
a full nine months from when the angel told
the blessed Virgin what she could expect. Continue reading
Joe Biden and Seamus Heaney
It means once in a lifetime
That justice can rise up
And hope and history rhyme.
Continue reading
Elegy for the Corncrake by Michael Boyle
An Elegy for the Corncrake (On September 26 2020 local bird watcher Jared Clarke saw a corncrake on the South- east coast of Newfoundland.) Crek craik, crek craik crek craikNear noon on that Saturday mornon the boggy bake apple barrensflushed out by the spottersat a droke close Cape Race.You were only just a couple hours … Continue reading
Poems in English and Irish
Finally, I gently clasp the dragonfly’s wings
and release it at the backdoor to fly away.
Was it a lost soul of a relative
From long ago looking for our prayers? Continue reading
Dánta Póca Julie Breathnach-Banwait
Discovery of another poet writing in Irish, to the great acclaim of her peers. Continue reading
Ode to the Women of Ireland
The winner of the Percy French Prize for Witty Verse. Continue reading
Cuckoon’s Nest
Working through Irish-music tune-names for an article in the 3rd edition of Companion to Irish Traditional Music, Fintan Valelly was time-travelled back to the 1800s, conjured by those melodic ‘handles’ into a heaving landscape of people, lives, places and the everyday. Continue reading
Tinteán 