At The Age for This
I’m at the age for this The funerals: all to common now I dont go to them all anymore To commiserate with …
Phonecalls Never Made
I meant to ring but never did He normally did but never did The unspoken though that silent hid Told the truth, …
Dawn Breaks as Yeats Goes to Sleep
Yeats died before the outbreak of war, and his Nobel prizes and international fame was most seen through the Versailles era, with …
To Live In Hearts
“To live in hearts we leave behind is to not die” – Thomas Campbell To live in hearts we leave behind It …
Rattling Buckets Cant Be Seen
A boy, an errand, and a bucket of beer … A drain, a death, and now a ghost does appear … A …
Wake at Ballinalee
My mother told of attending a wake when a child in her native village Ballinalee, where the pipes that were smoked cermonially …
This Is What Death Looks Like
The wild stare as his last breath His weakened lungs struggled to make A gaping mouth as to breath He tries, his …
There Is No Time for Art
Was at the Body and Soul festival doing a reading with my fellow Tullamore Rhymers, and this one got a good reception. …
Clonmacnoise: The Ancient City
Reflection on visiting the monastic site at Clonmacnois…
I Hope When Old to Waste My Time
From a GB Shaw quote, who was no fan off chess, unlike me, who is!
Piecing together the JIGSAW for Mental Health in Offaly
Death walks among us. In every town and village in Ireland, in all communities, even the Irish Traveller community in which it …
All Sorts of Accents at Accents Café
As per invitation, we arrived at Accents Café on Lower Stephens Street for seven-ish. OK, for once, I was actually early, arriving …
Out of Tune
No fingers now draw from it chords That it once formed, each one like words Now only insects and birds Dwell among …
I Shall Prepare a Feast For Thousands… And Yet Never Grease a Pan
A humersome yet morbid ghazal, for Halloween!!! All in the world around you is dead Or to you it appears to be …
Breaching the Veil
Death creeps like a shadow and darkens our lives… In time the truth we see The shadow is cast by the unseen …
Irish Family Funerals
Last Patricks Day, everyone else went to the parade dressed in green. Not us. We are Cartys We are from Longford. We …
Lovers of Valdaro
As in life, in death, they lie, embraced In the Eternal Cloak of the cold cold ground The warm bonds of an …
Death on a Traintrack
A stopped train, and I awaken In the middle of some godforsaken Piece of country, as an announcement is making By some …
A Phonecall Overheard
A double suicide delayed by train back to Dublin after the Poets Express event in 2010. The pointlessness of it inspired the …
December 8th 2011
Cold wet soil of winter Is now her bed, darkness Eternal, wooden case embraces The body now still, but she Feels not …