Galman Frederick Ferguson
''I can't keep up, you're
moving too fast,
Deep holes and darkness,
these things will pass.
Dark times and strange places where...
When I came to see you
you had nothing to say,
I stood right beside you,
you turned the other way,
I reached out to hold you
and found nobody there,
You turn into air.
''
I want to be a tree... reaching high up into your heaven... rooting deep into your heart...
Call it a curse, whatever
It hurts me so good
I'm trapped between good and bad
Call it a romance, anything
Would it still be romantic if it takes lives?
Call it a love poem, maybe.
Why do i feel dirty reading it out loud?
Call it haunting, right.
Maybe it is indeed.
Why am i not afraid?
Call it erotica, oh yes.
Why haven't i hit the climax yet?
You are so beautiful it's so painful to love you...
Enjoyment and love by the water
We, blanketed in the sweet scent of sunset
As the world and daylight sever
Pouring our bare feet into grass of velvet
Vanilla skies reflected in the water
We stare deep like never
Benighted yet radiant and true
As the moon lights and seeps through you
Another kiss to another song
In every melody and pleasure
Ever so kind and fond
Like a precious treasure
We merge into a song
That i sing to your heart
''Come shine and light me
Like a twinkle in your eyes
As you stand on my bank before the starry water
Ever so fair ever mine''
Perfectly touched, intimacy here in this very room you could never wait to rush into, lit only by candles, wrapped up in our winter blanket.
Several glasses of wine to go, and story after story by midnight.
Touch after touch...
Never laughed without thoughts of tomorrow...
I could never lit my cigarettes without flashes of the fire in your eyes burning our nights away...
It's your perfume merging with the scent of the pine walls that always brought me here...
Bed and sheet you could always fall into...
I felt safe here with my fingers running through your hair...
Through the homesickness on your face...
Mere as it was yet deeply comforting...
The only thing that lingered on without your presence...
She says follow me
I do like a puppy.
She says stop
I don't.
She says what do you want?
I say you
She says but you have to stop
I say stop me then
She says i can't. You're a man
I say you can. You're a woman.
Blessed as the first blooms of spring
This walk enchants me as you sing
You are heavenly gold-gilded
Only to me your body was deeded
Cold as the last flowers of summer
Yet firmly you walk the wonder
One dream for each night
All nights for the moonlight
White is your troubled heart
Ever finds enjoyment to never part
There i linger in my pleasure the good
Till i close my eyes for good
Send me not to distraction
Enlighten me with your passion
As here in my father's land i shall wait
Till you rest with me in faith
Wine and cigarettes all i have in vain
But nothing comes close to ease my pain
Winter has frozen my pale fingers
As i walk and linger
My father's last words flew through my heart
As he touched my face and i cried to never part
The wood floor creaked as i walked
The walls shattered as i talked
He said the old house is alive
I knew it when it was so quiet at night
Whenever i said my flat prayers to Christ
I did not come back for melancholy of my boyhood friends
As memories have always been in the right places to suspend
Like cold brief kisses shared before goodbyes
Struggling for never ending happines to come by
Autumn came when i was still deep in slumber
Tucked up innocent in his warm chamber
Whenever i opened my eyes again he was there
Watching out the window, looking so fair
There were nights when the ferry docked
And those distinct shapes in the mist outside i could not make out
There he went away
Ferried over so far away
As i did to him likewise now
The Sycamore trees... They have their own stories... They have seen much... Heard much... Known much... Witnessed much...
The house was built in 1807 by Reuben McFerguson for his irish wife. McFerguson was a retired scottish teacher who moved to Ireland to start a new life. They got married in 1805 in Edinburgh. Living a hard life in Edinburgh they decided to move to Kilkenny. There he built her a house which would later be known as The Sycamore. In 1809, three years after the sudden move, their baby boy was born. The only son they ever had. They named him Aindreas Crióstoir McFerguson (anglicized Andrew Christopher Ferguson). Andy grew into a quiet young man. Two weeks after his
21st birthday in 1830, his father died of lung cancer. Despite being so young, he had to take the responsibility for taking a good care of the house and his mother. Andy was indeed a good looking young man. His being quiet was considered his sex appeal by many. Nobody knew or even had the slightest idea about his troubled soul.
One night he invited a young girl to dine with him. After his mother went to bed, he took the poor girl into the basement and then strangled her to death. He hid the body in one of the barrels of wine. The next two nights he invited two girls again. One girl each night. Killed them in the basement and hid the bodies in the barrels. He killed two more in the attic. His mother lived her days till she died, 7 years after the killings, never knowing about five bodies hidden in the house.
After his mother's death, Andy lived like a ghost. He barely slept and visited his parents' graves regularly three times a week. In 1839, At the age of 30, he married Rachel Moore, whom he met at church (When he met her, he'd been regularly going to church every week to become closer to God). They had two daughters, Marie and Johanna and a son, Jeremy. Each born in 1841,1843,and 1847. Due to The Great Famine, they rented out the house to be used as a temporary mortuary until the famine ended in 1850.
In 1852, being haunted by his crime, and the need (which kept coming back) to kill again, Andy ended his own life by hanging himself in the basement. His wife sold the house and moved to Belfast with her children.
In 1857, Mr.Lowell, the man who bought the house, decided to renovated it. His workers found the bodies of the five women. They also found Andy's old journal and then learnt of how the killings happened. Knowing that Andy's wife had nothing to do with the killings, they didn't bother asking her at all.
In 1884, Andy's son, Jeremy moved back to Kilkenny and bought the house back from Mr.Lowell's son. Another renovation and then (which was already known as 'The house of the dead fairs') 're-occupied', the house was once again owned by a descendant of its first owner.
Jeremy had five children. His oldest son, Matthew inherited the house.
In 1922, Jeremy passed away. Before he died he asked Matthew to take a really good care of the house. Though later Matthew sold the house to an english doctor, his son Reuben bought it back in 1938. Reuben's son, Patrick, from his second marriage, was born in 1950. Armand, another son was born in 1954. At the age of 19 Patrick converted to catholicsm and then became a pastor. Armand moved to Carrickfergus and married a girl he met there in 1980. Armand had three sons. In 1989, three days before christmas, Armand was killed by some unknown men who broke into his house. After his son's death, Reuben moved to his wife's hometown, Edinburgh. Blaming Armand's wife for Armand's death, Reuben never tried to make any kind of contact with her.
In 1990, Reuben and his son's widow reconciled.
He asked her to move back to Kilkenny. In 1994, Emma... Armand's widow.... My mother... Moved back to Kilkenny to occupy The Sycamore, The House..... and start a new life... And with Reuben's permission, she married his husband's cousin, Isaac Ferguson...
I walk my way down the hill
Boys of this town, once so alive and real
Long-expected, so fair and innocent
Walking the land with excitement
Hares and butterflies, nightmares and night skies
Their skins bare, hoping looks in their eyes
Night fell on their innocent banks
I cried as the moon sank
Where are my boys...
For i could not hear their loving voices
An empty room marked my longing
The cold autumn breeze caught my singing
My lullabies cold and frozen
For the path they had not chosen
Never grow up in my dreams
Just as the little stream
My boys swagger the day away
It is a long way
You were the only man i had always wanted to see
Walking down the road to the sea
Swaggering in your new jacket
Looking for fellas to bracket
In Carrickfergus they called you a robber
To me you were a handsome rover
Beautiful green eyes as the rolling hills
Your happy thoughts into me you had instilled
In Belfast you smuggled your hopes and fears
Slainté! You danced pints of beer away
Alas! They did not see your tears
You were on your own finding your way
My old friend, my sad handsome friend Patrick...
Alone you sang your weary songs and turned sick
I cried bitterly, nobody to lay you down
Summer,and you had no wheat to sow
Ah! You were so handsome and young
During summer days you smiled and cheered me up in my den
Calling out your name,i screamt at the top of my lungs.
You were gone....gone...you would never answer again
Run me to the ocean...
The only place i see the world in motion...
As the sky merges with the sea overcoming my emotion...
Run me to the ends of the earth...
Where life means nothing but a dearth...
Where death means nothing but a mirth...
Run me to His Holy Mountain...
I need to find The Fountain...
Of emotion, sense, and answers...
The night you were in me i felt so alive...
The next morning i woke up to find myself in a different world...
I saw like you...
I breathed like you...
Smelt like you...
Thought like you...
Smelt like you...
I can still smell your scent on me...
I can not forget the very first time i set eyes on you.
My heart was in a whirl as you mov'd closer to me.
Enchant'd may i have been, yet modest and true.
If i, wanton and impolite as i be, should have a fancy for 'ee,
I could have for my own eyes caused such a great pleasure.
For you were such a fair sight to the modest eyes.
Nay one man's eyes missed 'ee as swaggered.
J'ining the crowds, proud o' yourself med 'ee have been.
I miss those fair days, ol' Marygreen, by the weather spoiled were we.
'Twas i to seek 'ee, my being heart-tender, hurt to hope.
I oughtn't to hope for God's grace as you whisper'd my name,
Yet 'twas only what had troubled me.
My dear Sue, thine anger upon me was wanton.
As swiftly raged at me, unto me being surpris'd.
I love thee, may not i unto God be made
a saint.
Had i determined my course of action.
I could have been tolerable unto thine eyes.
My heart to pledge as of yore, yet torn and misled upon your path.
Alas! Don't 'ee charm-veiled come to conquer my heart as to setting about planning another journey not to be done.
Before God, and angels, though cast into agony,
'twas me unto whom you came when dark.
My Sue.... My dearest Sue....
A rose is not a rose until a woman picks it and places it next to her heart....
A song is not a song until a lover sings it to the earth and heaven.
A woman is not a woman until a man
finds her and makes her worth-loving.
You're the song that echoes in my heart.
You're the sound that beats in my body every day and night.
You're the light that shines inside my darkest dreams.
You're the colours of my energy.
You're the last chapter of a book i will be reading before i die.
You're the face i see whenever i close my eyes.
You're my shadow...
Everytime you move you take the beauty of this world with you.
You walk through the hallway of my heart and fill the empty spaces.
My love for you is a perfume i pour at your feet.
Unto heaven and earth i am made a poem
Read and sung i will remain for good
i am love-drunk for you
You are the vineyard of my youth
More i drink,more i feel
How this beauty you gives out i seek
Had we never gone home...
Had we never sung our songs...
Had we never loved to part...
Had we never cried so hard...
Here was i calling out for ye.
They could hear me from Malin to Dursley.
O me heart lost and blind.
Torn and misled through the years.
There in Kilkenny,by the water,
Kind as the hills yet cold as Moher's cliffs was me father.
'where are ye going o lonely rover...'
'had ye never been loved by yer lover...'
Sang he,a song of loss and loneliness...
'o yer eyes painted a thousand pictures of long journey,rolling hills,running streams,and rugged coastlines'
'o how i miss walking on that road down the hill to the sea'
'o ol' Erin,to ye i gave me heart a long time ago with tear'
Come back to bed...
Come back into my life...
Come back to me...
I miss you tonight...
There was a little boy named Andy...
He was only nine years old when he died...
They buried him under a willow tree...
His father was so sad that he went insane...
One night he went to his son's grave...
Dug him out quickly...
And carried him home on his shoulder...
He then made him a dummy...
Turned him into a wooden dummy...
Painted a stiff smile on his dead face...
Put his play outfit on him...
Sat him in his favourite chair...
In the living room...
Put some music on...
He has gone home...
He has gone home...
He sang so loud that he got tired and fell asleep...
In his dream he saw his son dancing...
Bouncing around...
Singing out loud...
When he woke up his dummy son had disappeared...
He was not in sight...
He sought for him all night long but he could not find him...
He did not know...
While he was asleep deep in his agony...
Somebedy broke into his house and stole his dummy son...
Sold it to a russian ventriloquist for a few pennies...
He cried all night long...
He went back to his son's empty grave...
Crying...singing his sad song of loss and loneliness and agony...
When he went back home...
He found his dummy son sitting in his favourite chair...
With two bleeding hearts beating on his lap...
The hearts of the man who took him away....and the russian ventriloquist...
His father blurted out his happiness....
Held his son's cold wooden body tight....
Stroking his grinning dead face gently...
His son sat back still...
He stood still...
He was just a dummy...
Just a wooden dummy...
Across the water, away from here.
I had left my heart on the green.
Only sound of your shore i hear.
A glimpse of your waters i have seen.
In Belfast Old McCarthy sang his sad songs.
To lovers who had been waiting so long.
He walked on that long road down the hill to the sea.
He danced his songs away for us to see.
Carrickfergus, this longing i can not bear any longer.
In another town i sing like a lonely rover.
O ocean breeze fly me home i sing.
I miss to dance a fling.
My heart thumps like the sound of a bodhran.
Across the ocean my songs span this flood of longing.
Before God and men alone i stand.
Serving you is my true calling.
I want to come home to see her.
Her hair radiant beneath the sun.
My love and songs i want to share.
Across the hills to her i will run.
You were the only man i had always wanted to see
Walking down the road to the sea Swaggering in your new jacket
Looking for fellas to bracket
In Carrickfergus they called you a robber To me you were a handsome rover Beautiful green eyes as the rolling hills Your happy thoughts into me you had instilled
In Belfast you smuggled your hopes and fears
Slainté! You danced pints of beer away Alas! They did not see your tears
You were on your own finding your way
My old friend, my sad handsome friend Patrick...
Alone you sang your weary songs and turned sick
I cried bitterly, nobody to lay you down Summer,and you had no wheat to sow
Ah! You were so handsome and young During summer days you smiled and cheered me up in my den
Calling out your name,i screamt at the top of my lungs.
You were gone....gone...you would never answer again
