history:
something to fear and covet.
We are the only visitors.
Notices tell us in two old languages
(one mine) that this is Caisleán na dTúath,
Doe Castle. A castle for everyman.
It has ramparts, towers, a dungeon –
we step over gridded emptiness.
The floors have rotted away in seventy years;
the spiral stair endures, a little chipped,
after four hundred. Here is my phobia.
And for you, at the top of it,
yours: a wind-racked vacancy,
a savage drop, a view with no holds –
to which you climb; and if you do, I do:
going up, after all, is the lesser challenge.
The high ledge receives us.
We stand there half a minute longer
than honour and simple vanity require;
then I follow you down the stone gullet,
feet on the splintering treads, eyes inward,
and we step on springy grass
once again; there have been no lapses.
Now ravens ferrying food up to a nest
make their easy ascents. Pleased with our own
we stroll away to eat oranges in the car.
Kilmacrenan
The hailstorm was in my head.
It drove us out into the blind lanes
to stumble over gravel and bog,
teeter on the skidding riverbank
together, stare down and consider.
But we drew back. When the real hail
began its pounding upon us
we were already half recovered.
Walking under that pouring icefall
hand in hand, towards lighted rooms,
we became patchworks of cold and hot,
glowing, streaming with water,
dissolving whatever dared to touch us.
Glenshane
Abandoning all my principles
I travel by car with you for days,
eat meat from tins, drink pints of Guinness,
smoke too much, and now on this pass
higher than all our settled landscapes
feed salted peanuts into your mouth
as you drive at eighty miles an hour.
Beginnings
Future Work
‘Please send future work.’
– EDITOR’S NOTE ON A REJECTION SLIP
It is going to be a splendid summer.
The apple tree will be thick with golden russets
expanding weightily in the soft air.
I shall finish the brick wall beside the terrace
and plant out all the geranium cuttings.
Pinks and carnations will be everywhere.
She will come out to me in the garden,
her bare feet pale on the cut grass,
bringing jasmine tea and strawberries on a tray.
I shall be correcting the proofs of my novel
(third in a trilogy – simultaneous publication
in four continents); and my latest play
will be in production at the Aldwych
starring Glenda Jackson and Paul Scofield
with Olivier brilliant in a minor part.
I shall probably have finished my translations
of Persian creation myths and the Pre-Socratics
(drawing new parallels) and be ready to start
on Lucretius. But first I’ll take a break
at the chess championships in Manila –
on present form, I’m fairly likely to win.
And poems? Yes, there will certainly be poems:
they sing in my head, they tingle along my nerves.
It is all magnificently about to begin.
Our Trip to the Federation
We went to Malaya for an afternoon,
driving over the long dull roads
in Bill’s Toyota, the two boys in the back.
It was rubber plantations mostly
and villages like all Asian villages,
brown with dust and wood, bright with marketing.
Before we had to turn back we stopped
at a Chinese roadside cemetery
and visited among the long grass
the complicated coloured graves,
patchwork semi-circles of painted stone:
one mustn’t set a foot on the wrong bit.
Across the road were rubber trees again
and a kampong behind: we looked in
at thatched houses, flowering shrubs, melons,
unusual speckled poultry, and the usual
beautiful children. We observed
how the bark was slashed for rubber-tapping.
Does it sound like a geography lesson
or a dream? Rubber-seeds are mottled,
smooth, like nuts. I picked up three
and have smuggled them absent-mindedly
in and out of several countries.
Shall I plant them and see what grows?
Mr Morrison
Goslings dive in the lake,
leaves dazzle on the trees;
on the warm grass two ducks are parked neatly
together
something to fear and covet.
We are the only visitors.
Notices tell us in two old languages
(one mine) that this is Caisleán na dTúath,
Doe Castle. A castle for everyman.
It has ramparts, towers, a dungeon –
we step over gridded emptiness.
The floors have rotted away in seventy years;
the spiral stair endures, a little chipped,
after four hundred. Here is my phobia.
And for you, at the top of it,
yours: a wind-racked vacancy,
a savage drop, a view with no holds –
to which you climb; and if you do, I do:
going up, after all, is the lesser challenge.
The high ledge receives us.
We stand there half a minute longer
than honour and simple vanity require;
then I follow you down the stone gullet,
feet on the splintering treads, eyes inward,
and we step on springy grass
once again; there have been no lapses.
Now ravens ferrying food up to a nest
make their easy ascents. Pleased with our own
we stroll away to eat oranges in the car.
Kilmacrenan
The hailstorm was in my head.
It drove us out into the blind lanes
to stumble over gravel and bog,
teeter on the skidding riverbank
together, stare down and consider.
But we drew back. When the real hail
began its pounding upon us
we were already half recovered.
Walking under that pouring icefall
hand in hand, towards lighted rooms,
we became patchworks of cold and hot,
glowing, streaming with water,
dissolving whatever dared to touch us.
Glenshane
Abandoning all my principles
I travel by car with you for days,
eat meat from tins, drink pints of Guinness,
smoke too much, and now on this pass
higher than all our settled landscapes
feed salted peanuts into your mouth
as you drive at eighty miles an hour.
Beginnings
Future Work
‘Please send future work.’
– EDITOR’S NOTE ON A REJECTION SLIP
It is going to be a splendid summer.
The apple tree will be thick with golden russets
expanding weightily in the soft air.
I shall finish the brick wall beside the terrace
and plant out all the geranium cuttings.
Pinks and carnations will be everywhere.
She will come out to me in the garden,
her bare feet pale on the cut grass,
bringing jasmine tea and strawberries on a tray.
I shall be correcting the proofs of my novel
(third in a trilogy – simultaneous publication
in four continents); and my latest play
will be in production at the Aldwych
starring Glenda Jackson and Paul Scofield
with Olivier brilliant in a minor part.
I shall probably have finished my translations
of Persian creation myths and the Pre-Socratics
(drawing new parallels) and be ready to start
on Lucretius. But first I’ll take a break
at the chess championships in Manila –
on present form, I’m fairly likely to win.
And poems? Yes, there will certainly be poems:
they sing in my head, they tingle along my nerves.
It is all magnificently about to begin.
Our Trip to the Federation
We went to Malaya for an afternoon,
driving over the long dull roads
in Bill’s Toyota, the two boys in the back.
It was rubber plantations mostly
and villages like all Asian villages,
brown with dust and wood, bright with marketing.
Before we had to turn back we stopped
at a Chinese roadside cemetery
and visited among the long grass
the complicated coloured graves,
patchwork semi-circles of painted stone:
one mustn’t set a foot on the wrong bit.
Across the road were rubber trees again
and a kampong behind: we looked in
at thatched houses, flowering shrubs, melons,
unusual speckled poultry, and the usual
beautiful children. We observed
how the bark was slashed for rubber-tapping.
Does it sound like a geography lesson
or a dream? Rubber-seeds are mottled,
smooth, like nuts. I picked up three
and have smuggled them absent-mindedly
in and out of several countries.
Shall I plant them and see what grows?
Mr Morrison
Goslings dive in the lake,
leaves dazzle on the trees;
on the warm grass two ducks are parked neatly
together
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