Pastel Shades A Christmas poem, about failing libido maybe or a dullness that seeps into the bones in winter and later life. Perhaps what Dylan Thomas calls the “dying of the light”; not that there is much rage in this poem, it is more a complaint about a general lack of intensity in a dull…
In Ennerdale Last July my niece Jenny and I went wild camping to the English Lake District and this is a poem about that memorable end of day experience of lake-light and vision. Ennerdale Water is the most westerly glaciated lake in Cumbria, very deep and the area has been designated for “re-wilding”….well I…
Healing in Poetry I have been reading Tara Bergin’s “This is Yarrow”, a collection of her poems shortlisted for The Irish Times/Dún Laoghaire “Poetry Now” competion which takes place from the 11th. to the 14th. September. See http://www.mountainstosea.ie There are several other poets shortlisted and this formed the basis for a summer read-in of my…
Another poem from my trip to The Lake District with my niece Jenny. The photo is not Angle Tarn but it is such a great photo of Jenny’s I thought I would use it. The importance of not losing the adventure of youth and in many ways reconnecting with it later again is so…
Wild camping at Red Tarn My niece Jenny and I have been camping and walking in the English Lake District for a week. There were several highlights, apart from enjoying each others companionship, one of which was a shared meditation we did in late afternoon on the trail with most other walkers gone home. We…
In the Market The lad behind the stall sells me garlic and early potatoes. He isn’t pushy so I return each week to chat and buy. Watching him today in baggy pants I express amused concern as he unloads a box of apples and rises stiff with pain. Eager to help and meet him, with…
Here is a new elegaic poem about the young men who die every few months or so it seems in my home city of Galway, on the River Corrib, on the wild North Atlantic. Its pubs were once described in a Rough Guide to Ireland as full of “a sullen hedonism” which much amused…
An Exhibition of Photographs Taken by Israeli Soldiers During Their Period of National Service Hosted by Trócaire Gallery of Photography, Meeting House Square, DUBLIN. Since Trócaire had awarded me €100 for my poem “Glaciers” I decided to use some of the prize money to visit this exhibition hosted by them in Dublin. I had of…
The Anchorhold “I must go down to the seas again…. To the gull’s way and the whale’s way where the wind’s like a Whetted knife….” Sea Fever, John Masefield. There are no ghosts in this house, those that lived here have all left the house in peace. Even the hungered souls that built it died…
What do we mean when we describe a feeling or experience as “spiritual”? In a You Tube conversation with Pyrrho 314, Matt Segal (Footnotes to Plato, see my blog roll) makes some comments towards a definition of Spirituality. I felt we didn’t quite get to grips with it on that occasion and wanted to explore…
The Hug of Gaia 