WALKING TIME

How’s it going, Da? An will tú ann?
            Still down the well in the Cork Arms?
Do you remember our day out in the Fiat?
            We burnt rubber, wheeling it pronto to Bweeng.
You were County Cycling Champ again
            on those war-rationed wheels of cane.
In Ainm Dé, it’s tough to talk with you
            in a language you haven’t got
and, Da, that’s between us
            ever since I gathered the shavings,
those gold locks, welling round my ankles.
            I stared up at you.
I can still smell them, fresh
            as new leaves – there must be forests
of deciduous shaving-trees in carpenter’s paradise.
            I’m ráiméising on, or more like claw-hammering
on the ivories of the piano’s stairs.
            I’m ghost-playing, shadow-fingering
on the mockeyah keyboard of the kitchen table
            that was made in your very own workshop.
The dying notes of Irish reverberating;
            hitting home that morning the word Bweeng,
issuing from the radio, stopped me in my tracks.
            It reminded me of John Coltraine’s sax gyring
and gyving a note on The Blue Train, wedging
            my heart fast with a tenon-joint.
I hammer out notes on the black and white mortise keys  
            of your rock-steady table, each leg hewn in metric feet.
The table is a sound quatrain
            that even Blind Taigh, an file,
would have stood over.
            You could gut a pig on it, you said,
the way those farmers used to, when you, a journeyman,
            footed it from house to house along the Blackwater.
There are days I feel the blood of a squalling pig,
            throat slit, darkening the grain of southern pine.
The knell of Cork bells rings out
            in me under the current of everything.
I wade in and go with the flow, vamping
            it again along the river from the sawdoctor
on the South Gate with your saw stuck under me oxter.
            I swim home, a sawfish,
along Sully’s Quay, and his question:
             “Your Jim Hurley’s son, so?”
is proof positive that I’m cut from a line  
            of surnames engraved on a saw handle;
sawyers: Riordan, Hurley, Boyce . . .
            still reverberating inside my head.
“There’s a smell of dead men from that”
            you enjoindered, men
tenon-wedged with black humour,
            grasping pints that solved nothing;
the hungry ghosts from the sword side of Carraig
            on their own walking time up
and down the stairs,
            polishing the stone steps
till you can see you own shade in them.
            I must follow them now through Castle,
or else they’ll be the death of me.  
            They keep harassing me to listen to their calling,
but I blocked them out.
            I suppose I wasn’t ready for them.
Mind you, I couldn’t quite shut out  
            their muttering, always dogging me,
crowding my doorstep, the ancient
            and the lately dead jostling each other.
God, give me the strength to open the door
            and allow them in to drink from the pool
of blood darkening our table.  
            Then let them be off and leave me in peace.
The Irish I learned on Sully’s Quay muzzled English.
            I can’t ignore that trap growling up at me any longer.
Once I’d have called this walking time: Tráth Siúil.
            Now it’s clear my way’s wedged between the two.
I feel a bit like the sawdoctor
            honing a new edge on the blade’s snarl,
every second tooth of English is turned one way, the incisor
            of Irish, in the centre, is turned the other.
You must have felt the same on your walking time
            when you moved from Bweeng into the big city.
You were given walking money for the time
            it took to vamp it from bus to work site.
It dawned on you
            that the green country pup
was a fully grown man with his carpenter’s card.
            Despite all your wandering you never left
the Castle of your Bweeng youth.
            I understood that as we scorched the road,
those cane wheels still sparking the cinder path.
            I often think of the haymaker you made farmers,
the larch’s tumbling butt –
            that name springs from my mouth
like the shafts of a cart rising into the air
            when the horse is untackled and steps from the trap.
I’m knackered now, Da, hammering home words
            as you were beat hammering home nails.
All poets and carpenters can give is their all.
            Take it easy, Da. Don’t be too rough on yourself.
Mind you, be tough with the things that matter.
            The crime is
we don’t know in good time
            what’s precisely in our best interest.
By the time we do we feel unworthy
            of it all – the cruellest cut of all.
We try every other way of walking
            the walk till we can neither walk or stand.
At times, when I visit you,
            I have to learn myself
how to plant my feet squarely on the ground.  
            I watch you walking on this foreign planet
of a world, a tight grip on your walking stick.
            Your air soles shuffle for a level on the bed
of the floor, your sharp carpenter’s eyes
            still read the angles of a theodolite upside
down, searching for level ground.
            Christ, Da, life’s at odds with intelligence.  
The crooked curves of love
            tripped me up, despite my gratitude to you
for Euclid’s plain, Pythagoras’s theorem.
            The muse sees the windmills in the hypotenuse.
I know, Dad, I’ve always been a bit of a shaper.
            When we struck out for Bweeng that day
you recalled your prize for the race on cane wheels;
            a brace of porcelain dogs you gave your mother.
They got lost among your sisters till we gathered
            in the lonesome, pale white house after Nellie’s funeral.
We doggedly ripped letters into pieces, packed plastic bags
            with scribbled conversations between Dunmanway,
Chicago, Malla, Melbourne, Birmingham, Sutton –
            bags full of remote confabs: “I hope these lines find you well”,
“Jim’s must be big now”, “Are you coming down Nell?”.
            I, a tearer, furtively read, listening to snippets
between glances at the letters and the rest of you.
            I had to get out. You found a pair of porcelain spaniels
in the wardrobe and another pair, the exact same, in the loft:
            a household of fully reared porcelain spaniels.
The pair on your mantelpiece stares down the other
            in your window for the prize at Bweeng, your porcelain eyes
and mine finally levelled with one another.

Walking Time

Walking Time

How’s it going Da? Nhfuil tú ann?
            Fós ag triall ar an dtobar sa Cork Arms?
An cuimhin leat an lá sochaideartha
            gur thugamar do na boinn rubair é
sa Fiat Cinquecento go dtí Na Boinn,
            gothaí Don Hurleone ort ach tú fós
ag rás ar raon na gcnámhóg id rothaí
            ar na boinn chána cheal rubair chogaidh
id Cork County Champion on cinders i 1943?
            A Chríost, Da, is deacair labhairt leat
i dteanga nach bhfuil agat is fós atá againn
            eadrainn is a chruthaíos ar dtúis as carn
duala seíbhíní órga idir mo dhá ghlúin
            gharsúin ag faire ort ó urláir –
gheibhim a mboladh anois chomh húr
            le duilliúr ag fás ar chrainn, ní foláir
nó tá foraoiseacha crann séibhíní
            duillsilteacha i bparthas na siúinéirí –
Cad a bhíos a rá? Sea,  nó ag cnagadh ceol chasúr
            ladhrach ar chéimeanna loma pianó-staighre
is a sheinnim anois ar an méarchlár
            ar an mbord cistine ód bhinse ceirde,
is gan im theanga ach creilldeiriúcháin faoi mar
            a chuala Bweeng á rá ar an raidió lá,
mar a sheinnfeadh sax Coltrane cuilithíní
            nóta ar an Blue Train a dhingeadh
tionúir stoptha sa chroí ionam.
            Cnagaim nótaí i dtiúin leis an moirtís is tionúr
id bhord neamhghuagach, ceann snoite ar cheann
            sna cosa meadarachta ar chuma dhá leathrann
a shoífeadh Tadhg Dall is bheadh a sheasamh orthu.
            You’d kill a pig on it, a dúraís-se,
mar a dheineadh feirmeoirí cois Abhann Móire
            is tú id shiúinéir ar do phá ó thigh go tigh acu,
is bíonn laethanta go mbraithim fuil na muc á sá
            ag doirchiú an bhoird fan snáithe an southern pine.
Ringeálann cling chreill Chorcaí
            go binn ionam i gcónaí fóthoinn –
duán an ‘ng’ le tocht go docht im ghut
            is níl dul as ach é a scaoileadh amach –
ó thugainn féin do na boinn fóthoinn é
            i sruth na habhann led thoireasc
faoi m’ascaill ó sháibhlia an Gheata Theas
            ag snámh abhaile im sawfish
fan Sully’s Quay is a cheist
            You’re Jim Hurley’s son, so? gur theist
dhearfa í ar bheith i measc
            línte sloinnte ar lámha na dtoireasc,
doirne na siúinéirí, Riordan, Hurley, Boyce,
            fós ag clogadadh im phlaosc.
There’s a smell of dead men from that
            le greann ón ndorn dubh a fháisceann
greim docht ar phiúnt nach bhfuasclaíonn
            an tart na an boladh a leath
le sinsearacht na marbh athartha ón gCarraig
            is a d’fhág rian snasta cos ar chéimeanna
cúnga na gcloch ón mbarr anuas
            is aníos ón mbun go barr
a chaithim leanúint trí thigh túir
            an Chaisleáin nó is iad mo phúir iad.
Is iad a d’impigh orm éisteacht lena gcreill
            ach nár thógas ceann díobh
mar nach rabhas ábalta air
            cé gur thugas toradh orthu
lena gcogar cianda
            anuas trí na glúnta
is ag bailiú ar mo thairseach
            ársa agus comhaimseartha
ar aon bhuille in éineacht
            is, le cúnamh an uile, scaipfidh a scáth uaim
Luigh Port Uí Shúilleabháin anuas
            ar mo shlí ón nGeata Theas ar ball
cé go ndranann na fiacla casta
            i mbéal Sully’s aníos arís le call,
im walking time nach tráth siúil é
            a thuilleadh ach slí faille eatarthu
ar chuma slí an tsáibhlia ag gearradh
            faobhar nua ar dhraid lainne,
gach re fiacail casta i dtreo amháin
            an fhiacail idir péire casta sa treo eile
ar nós do walking time féin tráth
            a d’aistrís ó Na Boinn isteach sa chathair
is gur lámháileadh pá duit ar an am siúil
            ón mbus go dtí do láthair
oibre is gur bhraithis den chéad uair
            go raibh an t-ógánach tuaithe
ina fhear déanta lena chárta siúinéara.
            Ach dá mhéid do shiúlta níor fhágais
do Dhuibhneacha sna Boinn riamh id dhiaidh
            is nuair a thugamar do na boinn é an lá san
is ea a thuigeas go raibh na cnámhóga fós
            á ngreadadh dearga agat faoi na boinn chána.
Is cuimhním i gcónaí ar an larch tumbling butt,
            an fearas féir a dheinis d’fheirmeoirí,
braithim an ainm ag éirí dem theanga spring-loaded  
            is coca ar a barr ag spreangadh in iothlainn
mar a phreabfadh leathlaithe in airde san aer
            ach a shiúlódh capall gan tackle as béal cairte.
Táim tnáite, Da, ag buillí pasúir ar mo theanga
            mar a bhís-se tráth ag buillí casúir ag tiomáint tairne,
is nach bhfaightear as filí is siúinéirí araon
            ach an lán anama a bhíonn iontu.
Tóg breá bog é, Da, ná bí dian ort fhéin
            is bí dian in the things that matter,
nach é an marú nach mbíonn fhios againn
            in am trátha cad é go díreach lár ár leasa,
is fiú nuair a bhíonn fhios againn é nach fiú linn
            sinn féin é, an peaca is measa,
is go dtriailimid gach slí ag siúl na slí go dtí
            nach mbíonn siúl ná seasamh ionainn feasta,
is gur chaitheas féin a fhoghlaim an athuair
            conas mo dhá chois a chur ar an dtalamh –
uaireanta nuair a théim ar cuairt chugat féin
            bíonn tú ag siúl ar phláinéad eachtrach
an domhain, greim amháin ar mhaide croise
            is do bhoinn aeir ag lorg leibhéil ar ghrinneal
coincréite mar a bheadh do ghrinneas sároilte súl,
            a léigh uillinneacha theodilite bunoscionn,
aistrithe síos go dtí cothrom na talún –
            a Chríost, Da, tá an saol bunoscionn lenár n-éirim.
Cuair anchruthacha an ghrá a thug cor coise
            dom bhoinn chomhchosacha, dá mhéid mo bhuíochas
duit ar son plána Euclid, teoragán Pythagoras –
            muilte gaoithe a chíonn an muse ar an hypotenuse,
I know, Da, I was always a bit of a shaper.
            Is nuair a thugamar do na boinn é go dtí Na Boinn
chuimhnís ar do dhuais don rás ar na boinn chána,
            dhá mhadra poircealláin a thugais dod mháthair
is a bhí imithe gan tuairisc i measc do dheirféaracha,
            go dtí gur bhailíomar sa tigh bán tar éis sochraid Nellie
ag mionstracadh litreacha teaghlaigh, ag líonadh málaí
            plaisteacha de chomhraite pinn idir Dún Manmhaí
Chicago, Mala, Melbourne, Birmingham, Cill Fhionntain,
            lán málaí de chogair chianda ‘I hope these lines find you well’
‘Jim’s must be big now’ ‘Are you coming down, Nell?’
            is mé im stracaitheoir ag breacléamh is ag stracéisteacht
idir stracfhéachaintí ar na litreacha is ar an gcuid eile agaibh.
            Chaitheas fágaint. Tháinig sibh ar phéire spáinnéirí
poircealláin i vardrús is ar phéire mar a chéile san áiléar,
            teaghlach poircealláin spáinnéirí braoideálta lánfhásta.  
Tá péire ar do mhatal is péire ar fhuinneog do sheomra
            á fhéachaint le chéile le plé na súl don duais sna Boinn,
do shúile poircealláin féin is mo shúile mar a chéile leachtleibhéalta.