Jul 1
"BE DE HOKEY!"
uncle's old hat
inhabited now
by a black feral cat
I remember the laugh
always fixed
beneath that hat
forever tilted back
ready with the quick quip
tongue in cheek
his green corduroy trousers
nothing but rags
to shine shoes
first colour photo
we'd ever seen
those green corduroys
were really green
as if the photo was
necessary to prove it
attacking with a pin
the dirt caught
in the green ridges
"See that tree?" he'd tell me
that used to be me but
I grew out of it!"
words loved him
and would do anything
he said
I the small boy
wearing the fabled hat
in the act of being him
wearing the much too big
green corduroys
rolled up...held up by braces
"Be de hokey!"
I'd exclaim
quoting him
"Be de Holy Dublin!"
his catch phrases on my lips
creasing him up
"Hey ya little *****!"
( pretending to be mad )
"Yer better than that Charlie Chaplin!"
me bathing his feet
in a basin after
he put the cows to bed
a black cat
inhabits the now
curled up in Mikey's old hat
*
Dry, droll, laconic and ironic...he taught me just by the example of himself how to create a world from just a bunch of works and shape them until they fitted your thought. Everything could be so surreal and real with him at the one and the same time.The man who made me the poet I am today. One of the three Corkmen who were the treasure of my childhood.
I once went for an interview to get into some college up in Dublin and failed miserably. To merely put me at my ease the interviewer said who are your heroes and I at once said: "My Da, my uncles Seanie and Mikey!" And the interviewer said:" No...I mean real hereoes!" And I said:"My Da, my uncles Seanie and Michael." i knew even then that these were the men who were everything to me and shaped who I would be!" Their teachings were tender and gentle and I soaked them up by some emotional osmosis. I still claim that the best part of me today is...THEM.
uncle's old hat
inhabited now
by a black feral cat
I remember the laugh
always fixed
beneath that hat
forever tilted back
ready with the quick quip
tongue in cheek
his green corduroy trousers
nothing but rags
to shine shoes
first colour photo
we'd ever seen
those green corduroys
were really green
as if the photo was
necessary to prove it
attacking with a pin
the dirt caught
in the green ridges
"See that tree?" he'd tell me
that used to be me but
I grew out of it!"
words loved him
and would do anything
he said
I the small boy
wearing the fabled hat
in the act of being him
wearing the much too big
green corduroys
rolled up...held up by braces
"Be de hokey!"
I'd exclaim
quoting him
"Be de Holy Dublin!"
his catch phrases on my lips
creasing him up
"Hey ya little *****!"
( pretending to be mad )
"Yer better than that Charlie Chaplin!"
me bathing his feet
in a basin after
he put the cows to bed
a black cat
inhabits the now
curled up in Mikey's old hat
*
Dry, droll, laconic and ironic...he taught me just by the example of himself how to create a world from just a bunch of works and shape them until they fitted your thought. Everything could be so surreal and real with him at the one and the same time.The man who made me the poet I am today. One of the three Corkmen who were the treasure of my childhood.
I once went for an interview to get into some college up in Dublin and failed miserably. To merely put me at my ease the interviewer said who are your heroes and I at once said: "My Da, my uncles Seanie and Mikey!" And the interviewer said:" No...I mean real hereoes!" And I said:"My Da, my uncles Seanie and Michael." i knew even then that these were the men who were everything to me and shaped who I would be!" Their teachings were tender and gentle and I soaked them up by some emotional osmosis. I still claim that the best part of me today is...THEM.
