10 years ago …

[I don’t want to give you the impression I’m depressed now – so I better let you know I wrote this 10 years ago.]

https://audioboom.com/boos/5030988-a-poem-from-10-years-ago-ink-by-paul-o-mahony

 

Ink

There is a black blob of ink on my paper
and no amount of dipping the pen
will tidy the stain.

There was an inkwell sunk into my desk
and I used to gather a load of liquid
to decorate the page.

As the tool for writing became a fountain
and I learned to collect my ammunition
leaks came and pus dribbled.

This pool is drawning me down into its depth
and I’m too heavy to float in filth.
I need a good clean.

A note to my mother – August 2006

https://audioboom.com/boos/5021773-a-note-to-my-mother-2006

Dear Mum

If I simply say ‘you’re the best mum I’ve ever had‘,
you’ll know I’m in touch with previous lives.

But you’ll deserve it – because you brought us up
to think and duel with words, and look beyond

to the next time when I shouldn’t be late, or break
House Rules, lest you and I would give and take

for hours and hours – so I would learn and yearn
to be my own person – as is your way.

Poetry: “We played hide-and-seek on holidays”

We played hide and seek on holiday

I would close my eyes at evening,
the breeze would slip away
to another appointment.

I would count the lights go down,
cover my head from stars,
let the moon keep watch.

I would draw back shutters at dawn,
go search for the wind
outside

A mosaic of pale stone
ferociously pushing heat into my face,
a frog fixed in the pond with fierce eyeballs.

I would look behind corners of brilliant white
across luscious grass blades, erect, unmoving,
plumbago petals still under cork oaks,

palms hanging arced in the oven.
I would look and look,
until both eyelids would give in,

and call out to the wind:
You have won, Unfound One
You are master of this game.

A man I looked at twice

https://audioboom.com/boos/4999032-a-poem-a-man-i-looked-at-twice-by-paul-o-mahony

A man I looked at twice

I saw a man that reminded me of another,
grey bristles conjured up a face
I’d forgotten.

The forgotten put me in mind of the father
I’d lost, and that deathbed
brought back to life

the mother of my best friend
as she lay wasting
and the nurse checked the cathedra

made in a country where I’d visited
the Pied Piper’s adopted home
and fell asleep

in a single bed over which a portrait
of Saint Aloysius hung, next to the holy water font
replenished by an unknown agency.

 

___________________

Note:

I self-published the first version of this poem on my blog in January 2006 

 

I used to be nice


I used to be nice

Years ago
I composed this wish
Never noticed the clichés

I meant no vice:

may you go from strength to strength
may you soar over every sapping strain
may you float on the cushion of your dreams
until your sun sleeps and acorns reach maturity.

_________________

Note:

On 24th December 2005 – I self-published that bold stanza on my blog. Spot the phrase that doesn’t feel like a cliché to you …

To write a poem now

 

cafesmall

To write a poem now

To write a poem now
forgotten how,
fingers all too stale,
grown pale.
Unused soul went to sleep,
troubled deep.

Christ rose from the dead,
threw off sheets drenched in blood,
woke up, pushed the stone back
so light and birdsong dawned,
his dream made flesh,
again.

Fear revisited,
traces linger instead,
as if painted over.
Whitewashed over…

Jesus wrote his poem
on the road to Emmaus,
recovered from Gethsemane.
The words even ascended into Heaven
and were repeated.

To write a poem now…
the least I could do.

__________________________

Note:

I wrote this in 2011 – shortly after I recovered from a long bout of depression. I began it in Ely near Cambridge UK, & finished the first draft in my local much-loved haunt Cafe Beva, Glanmire, Co Cork. 

At the same time 

A woman leans 

elbows on a counter,

bends her right wrist

reveals painted fingernails

ring on middle finger.

She leaves a teaspoon in an empty coffee cup.

———

At the same time, 

a barista rinses stained cups in a sink,

heats a filter drip 

lets water flush down a drain,

replaces a glass jar of Columbian 

Tasting notes say

“stone fruits, milk chocolate, nutty”.

His hairy calves naked,

elbows sharp. 

———

At the same time, 

at a wooden bar,

two men play

‘Dungeons and Dragons”,

a fat crusty roll 

washed down by tap water.

A woman in a floral dress 

leans over, close,

demonstrates the best way

to lipstick both lips.

The men don’t ask to borrow her make-up.

——-

Bars explode and peter out…

Who is she? 


She’s a modern woman

I’ve never heard her speak.

Now I’m in love with her voice

angelic, soft, soothing

(not weak).

You probably imagine her saccharin, 

all sweetness and light

– so far.

(I bet you can feel the ‘but’ coming)

She utters a bitter sound of the night

across a breakfast table

turning in a bed

walking a street

brushing her teeth

even sitting to do her business.

Her voice creeps behind the words

subverts the common meaning of social intercourse.

Her stories are not my stories

If you stumbled across her vignettes

you might also mutter ‘they’re gold dust, 

they conceive, germinate, grow stronger

in the soil of daily life’.

And they bear seed

– whenever I get close enough.

Bookshops donate blood

I was born with a bookshop in my mouth

I’m not sure when I swallowed it.

Dell classics, ‘Sixty-four pagers’ and comics 

softened me up,

like butter and caster sugar 

in a mixing bowl.

I’m not sure how books imprinted on my double helix 

and passed from puberty 

to pulsating subjects of desire,

while I combed curly hair 

with Brylcream 

like my father

– like my book-selling father.

He’d grown up above the shop 

owned shelves, 

dusters  

and cash-registers.

“So long as you don’t bend back spines,

leave fingerprints, 

crease leaves, 

so we can sell each book as new,

I bid you read all you fancy.”

 A feast fit for a glutton

– I’m sure I read a book.

I certainly climbed trees, 

collected swords,

cut and sharpened spears, 

bent and strung bows

fixed berberis thorns 

fired arrows 

hurled clumps of earth,

released poison mushrooms, 

and built a war-room 

hidden in the bushes. 

– I’m sure I read a book.

I listened to ball-by-ball cricket, 

the Clitheroe Kid,

the Top Twenty

caddied for Dad,

cut grass for pocket money.

collected “Forty-Fives”

– I’m sure I read a book.

Drewled over particular photographs in National Geographics,

undistracted by text

vexed by interruptions.

– I hardly read a book until I left home.

Walking  down Dublin’s Dawson Street,

crossing Charing Cross Road, 

hurrying through Hay-on-Wye

or window-shopping streets 

of any self-respecting Quarter 

is a pain

is a pest

is a penence.

Bookshops slow me down, 

make me late

empty my pockets. 

Bookshops kidnap me

compel me to suffer 

the cries of authors, editors, printers, publishers – even marketeers. 

“Take me,

just read my blurb, 

fondle me, 

smell me, 

feel me between your fingers. 

Let’s go somewhere quiet and consummate. 

You may suck my blood.”

 

 

The Islander

Chapter One

He could have been on Sherkin, Inishbofin, Skelligs or even Rathlin…

He was an outlaw, cast away from the land,

away from his people.

His face didn’t fit,

his family were not from the right side of town.

There was no time for him, he could rot there.

Eventually his spirit would break,

he would comply, he would conform,

he would be broken

It would teach them,

show them not to meddle with our family,

not to get above themselves.

Yea, twenty-seven winters on Sherkin,

twenty-seven springs on the Skelligs

twenty-seven summers on Rathlin

twenty-seven years of nightmares

on any island you fancy.

It was good to keep him there, disappeared.

Our family had need of safety,

his family were dangerous,

thugs, revolutionaries, communists, rapists.

oh yea, uncouth, uncivilised, Untermenschen.

 

Chapter Two

Our family is special,

we have survived our own wars.

We’re used to feeling superior

Our family before all families

our tribe before all tribes

Our village the white man’s burden

Everyman is an island

We have not balked at blood sacrifice

We have buried our enemies in unmarked graves

– even displayed corpses to teach families how to behave themselves

We survived war against an Empire of superior force – that gave us backbone.

That gave us good enough reason to turn the tables on families of inferior beings.

Oh yes, our family is special – forever.

 

Chapter Three

You will not leave that island

You will languish in your dreams

You will scratch your balls

You will scrape the fleas in your hair

You will freeze your bollocks off.

We will control you.

When we let you out – it will be to die.

Our family is ordained to carry the burden of ruling this land.

Yes, your family is bigger than our family

Your family’s so big it’s disgusting.

Your people are everywhere

but your people are worthless

we’ve made sure of that.

________________
The sea the sea the sea

the waves the wind, the ocean, the cold

the fish the seaweed the waves the wind the cold the ocean

the seaweed the waves the wind the cold the ocean the seaweed
____________________

Eat your heart out Islandman – we have you.

Oh yes, we’ve had you now for 27 years.

How did you pull through?

 

Chapter 4

Are you coming off that island?

Are you coming to take our land?

to obliterate us?

to wipe us out?

coming to leave a bloodbath?

Are you going to leave the island

like an avenging angel

– the Assyrian descending on the fold?

Going to be the Inquisition?

Going to be ethnically cleansing us?

Are you going to force our children to leave?

split up all that we’ve created among so many

and leave everybody with hardly anything?

Who are you?

who are you after?

who are you after festering anger resentment?

You must be a walking bomb

walking terrorist

you must be a killer of all of our dreams.

I see you now,

we see you now,

step ashore

 

Chapter 5

I must say you look rather good after twenty-seven years.

If I’d been there for twenty-seven years

I probably wouldn’t have stood up as well as you look

maybe your family has some kind of metal in your DNA?

maybe you’re just bloody tough?

Who are you Islander?

Who are you warrior?

What’s in your mind?

What’s in that heart?

Why should we trust you?

–  the only thing we can trust is our own fear.

Yes, we’re outnumbered

Yes, your family is bitter.

What are those words forming in your mouth?

What’s that look in your eye?

What’s that breath from your nostril?

You’re walking towards us,

Are you coming to wipe us out?

Now that your time has come

Now that every other bastard has abandoned our family

and left us alone

left us isolated

left us rejected

Yea, we were at the forefront of fighting for what we believed in,

for what we thought others believed in.

Yes we were the top dogs once,

Now,

we’re lepers

spat on

rejected

no one from my family can get married into any other family.

And you will inherit the earth.

I expect you’ll get revenge now

You’re coming

You’re coming across

You’re coming ashore

You’re coming inland.

What’s that you hold in your hand?

What are you doing with your hands?

Towards whom are you

outstretching?

You don’t mean to offer me a hand

You cannot mean to stretch out a hand.

It’s a trick.

You want to persuade me you are a friend

come from twenty-seven years

on that,

on Sherkin, on Boffin, on Skelligs

You want me to believe that’s is a genuine hand?

As soon as you grip my hand

you’ll pull me under

you’ll squash me to death.

I know,

that’s what I’d do

if I was in your position.

You want my hand.

your hand is warm

your eye is warm

you are forming words

you are looking over my shoulder

beyond where i stand

you are looking beyond my family.

You have brought a flag with you

a towel,

a canopy

a rug

something that will go over everybody.

You expect me to join you

You expect me to work with you

You expect me not to run and hide

You expect me to accept you

You expect me to be your partner

And you will not take everything from me?

You will leave me with my money intact?

You will leave me with my capital acquired?

You will leave me with some shred of self-respect?

God

it feels like you’re offering me a route to Salvation

Where the hell have you come from?

Where the hell did you become like this?

You stretch out a hand of friendship

a hand of warmth,

a hand of the future

You restrain your family from eating me alive

You prefer us to be together than have us all go down.

You are serious?

Islandman,

What kind of a resurrection is this?

What stones have you rolled back?

What cave have you come from?

What sort of Heaven on earth are you trying to create?

When you were on that island,

and I was on the mainland,

you were a small guy.

You were locked up in a place

where i didn’t have to see your eyes

where I didn’t have to feel your hand.

But now I cannot avoid you

I cannot ignore you

I cannot step away from you.

That island:

Sherkin, Inishbofin, Skelligs, Aran,  Saltees, Lambay, Rathlin…

– they’re all our islands.

We’ve always used islands to lock inferior beings away out of sight.

Now those islands have turned everything inside out,

turned everything on its head.

I don’t know what to say

I don’t know where to look

I’ve embarrassed by your strength,

by your courage

by your power.

And you know what the worst thing is?

You’re so bloody humble

You are so bloody humble

You offer warmth, friendship

You offer togetherness

You offer hope

You offer a future,

My children – they don’t have to die

My children – they don’t have to run

Our children can play together.

Where have you come from?

What happened to you

on that island?

Is there any chance I can do twenty-seven years on that same island?

 

Chapter 6

The Unknown Unknown…

We are all the creators

all families creators

all individuals creators

Any chance we can all do twenty-seven years on the island?

The end of the beginning.

Lost on Bastille Day


https://audioboom.com/boos/4835479-lost-on-bastille-day-new-poem-by-paul-o-mahony

Lost on Bastille Day

‘Let them eat heads
and suck sockets dry
before they answer “Why”‘.

 

I’ve lost my count of children

– the adults never counted –

lost to the flags of war.

 

It’s said that ten valuable ones

were crushed on Thursday night

promenading where the English played.

 

Others say Fallujah girls and boys

were incinerated over falafels

and their fathers cried for ever.

 

If there are any grandchildren awaiting birth

they’ll be primed like birds of prey

to strike without warning.

 

Will you count the loss for us?

Portrait of a noble winesmith 

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Portrait

The wine he poured from an old glass

the grape distilled at least twice

the place inherited easily

from bishops, politicians and King.

The first growth he loved

Monsieur Christian –

guardian of the blue pool

alongside mosquitos

pink roses and a caramel tree

fortified juice a white touch –

paid taxes to the elected government

sold bottles for a living

walked in shade

as water flowed up from mountains.

Proprietor with title and vocation,

a travelled homme

le rouge et le blanc.

——

Note:

Written 3 August 2012 after a visit to Chateau de Beaulon

 

Dreams

Dreams

Moses never led his people to the promised land

Magellan never sailed his ships home

Puccini never finished his journey to Turandot

I’ve never reached my daydreams.

I led up to them,

talking and walking

barefoot on  moss,

across streams

to the other side.

I reached for them on tippy-toes

never let go.

That’s my trouble

I’m no Michelangelo

and so I watch those daydreams

grow and grow

into memories

–  elephants in  my room –

wondering  what Moses felt

as he watched the people

leave the desert

their daydreams shining.

Maybe it’s a feast to simply daydream

and trek on

until I lose the breath for daydreams

and ‘in that sleep of death‘

dream on.

 

Testament 

Testament

The bible is my survival

when they come

calling for my salvation

And it isn’t Matthew Mark Luke and John

that bail me out…

Who composed this poem?

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The moment I see

a thousand snowdrops blooming

under snowflake sky

I know my soulhome is here again

————–

Note:

I don’t know who wrote this. I don’t remember writing it. It’s in my iPhone notes without any information. 

So it won’t make it into my next poetry book or collected works. 

No matter – I like it – it means something to me.

If you wrote it – please claim it. 

Warmed

efb73ab86ce77ab10e63d1ab5480de04

Warmed

I am a wood frog in a previous life.

You would probably think I was dead

if you saw where I was inside logs and burrows

 

heart stopped

ice crystals in my blood.

I defrost in the warmth of Spring.

 

Before that, I am a deer mouse

huddled together snuggling with the others

I don’t live for long.

 

In my time, I am a white-tailed prairie dog, a bat, hedgehog.

I am even a skunk

suspecting that’s where I began.

 

Last December

I all came together in this chilled life –

until my sun got warm again.

Pulse

My child went to dance his night away.

And mine went for the love of her life.

My children had names.

My parents came out looking for  everlasting love.

My family were herded together like cattle

and passed into the cold beyond

kissed by the fire of bullets

from a manufacturing plant

owned by anonymous shareholders.

These are not my words

I have no words fit for a future

that blows like a gorgon’s breath

spawned by Hell’s army.

Bless me Father for I have sinned

I have lost my pulse

and wished the thieves the same.

My child, my child …

Hell

 

image

Hell

From the depths of Hell in summertime

Dante heard his name called

wished he’d misheard.

However,

he always knew it wasn’t enough

to write a description of Hell

to ward off the experience of hell on earth.

—

I am Dante

I’ve tried to write my way

out of misery

– wished many times

I could have woken up dead –

longer than that Italian moaned his lost love.

—-—————

Notes:

(1) This poem was written during a livestream Periscope on 8 June 2016 – in 10 minutes.

(2) The first line was suggested by @shaggydog69 “From the depths of Hell” & @brendyrussell11 “in summertime”.

(3) The scope was both nerve-wracking & fun.

Potato Poem (PP)

 

unnamed

Potato Poem

Dear reader…

You already know Continue reading Potato Poem (PP)

Bluebells – new poem by Paul O’Mahony 

Poem

draft:
 
 

Bluebells

When you go out to the bluebell wood

to paint the white bells blue

holding hands with your granddaughter

I advise you go by night

with light of the moon

– so you don’t paint the wrong bells

so neighbours don’t catch you mad

so you show her how to make magic

how to restore order in the universe.

Don’t squash the bluebells.

____________

With thanks to William FitzGerald  the storyteller