I, round the brae of Howth in chalky light,
Lamented my lot more spent in sport than play.
There, land appeared disinterested and sight
Was a teary well.  Cold was the shivering day,
And my frame, a ghost of shadow, was erased,
It receded like the fog.  Just then, overhead
I saw brave birds engaged, a raptor traced
A mourning dove’s faltering flight, how it fed
Its own shining sense of purpose, for not
Wanton sport or lordly state do falcons
So hunt, nor did the bird in peril belabour
His reason, rather he tried avoiding those talons.
A question answered itself within my breadth,
Survival resides in a pageantry of death.

A hundred crows from all corners,
Flew into view, and whirled about,
As if the cracked earth set quaking,
As if the sky was tiding, sloe black,
What ominous undulations accrued,
What murderous tribulations due?
The very sound they made was tear,
Was tirade and all those black flecks;
Dark sparkles of sun, shadows of fear.

Waking angel spoke:
'I am water— born in fire,
Lord, what have I done?'

The heron spreads his wings and preys.
His stony stand a beachhead sloughing
The salt sea, a sepulchered wading.

Leaven the broken bred, unshell
The teeming waters, a fisher of mermen
Unlordly low this lying father,
His wings are palms,

His rock a mount, his wings a bay,
And deafness, tears in the outer shores
And exaulted seas the forgiven waves,

Swells the briny blood and kelp.
Vains are streaming to the fisher king,
Lordy he lands the lying father
His wings are psalms.

A tiny flood that arcs the sky
Marks lord in miniature, a King
Fisher flies, His wings are
The waters calmed.

The otters bask and preen, mermen
Jostle in the laddered rays of the sun
They mark their surf, insouciant play,

Wavering the fisher of men, he sways,
Simply they circle in song singing hours,
Dancing as do the murmuring waves,
Their strokes are psalms.

.
The lone stark bugle cry—
Horn of the great mountain elk,
Ripples down cold through morning
Dusted wood as the mushrooming dews
Drop into dearly waded pools under
Fawning toes of forage and cool
Evergreen.

I saw a hunter by a country road,
In tandem with me he sailed as I drove.

His hoody-head set monkish to the soil
Conjured up music so soundful, sacred,
And I unmoving over a tired flesh—
Coloured vehicle felt naked and dead

For he so saintly robed and dressed to ****
In the colours of the sky prayed with wings,
My harrier, his eyes cleansed purity and gold
While mine unsightly piebald pale and blue.

But want of food dovetailed two craving
Creatures, yet, over fed I felt rusty
Below his steely hunger and what saving
Grace God might offer either mice or men.

In the dark room
Sparks fire—
Whispers of the sun
And silence blankets the sky,
I was born amongst the ruins
Of gentleness and wounded love,
By the dug kurgans of the Amazon,
The brands of rains ever burning
And foils of hope, fated, turning,
An outer beast eyes and howls,
The merciless stars ever sweep
And cowl in coldest sparkle flame,
Merest minded words, fainted, stab,
Drop in the down volumes of space
Evaporating under the brooding
Mortal emptiness.

Lune in still water—
Under my bridge of long night,
Judgement moon above.

Streams stealing away,
River clotted with salmon,
  .  .  .  Red handed otter.

Drops of heavy rain,
Seabirds tearing with the skies,
  .  .  .  So small without her.

Yawning dreams, slate hues,
Mystic shout mournful mountains,
  .  .  .  Connemara blues.

Grey waves creeping in—
White ley, washed stones, twisted wood,
  .  .  .  Bones of whale and tree.

Red edging needles, pine
On blue mountain, nostrils
Of elk smoke with a bulls
Eye, scarlet stares of steely,
Steepled raven, snow drifts,
White fires in the lighted sky.