Irish Elk

Irish Elk

Irish Elk

Giant antlers shine at night
diamond, sapphire, branch
 
in a neighbour’s garden,
light up the moonless dark
 
for children going to bed,
as if the Great Irish Elk,
 
extinct seven thousand years,
turned in his grave
 
beneath the lake at Lough Gur,
and bellowing rose
 
from the bog, trailing peat
from his hinds, to roam
 
the hills and woods of Ireland,
at this time of snow
 
falling all across the land,
on our road, ghost at
 
large, and twice as tall as Man
come back to haunt us.