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23h · 24
GLASS
Donall Dempsey 23h
GLASS
GLASS

only
her red purse
returns

Inside it a sweet
some small change &
blood besprinkled glass.

it alone
survives
the crash

Death is only
a newspaper headline.
still...this grief

I weep tears
that don't show up
on my face

I push my fingers
deep in the purse
cut my fingertips to bits

the held glass
(all I have of you)
scarring my face

blind
to the pain
blind to the pain

the old blood
and the new mingles
and once more

if only for a second
we are together
for as long as the pain lasts
Continue reading...
1d · 22
PER NOCTEM IN NIHILO VEHI ( TO VANISH BY NIGHT INTO NOTHING )
Donall Dempsey 1d
PER NOCTEM IN NIHILO VEHI ( TO VANISH BY NIGHT INTO NOTHING )
PER NOCTEM IN NIHILO VEHI
( TO VANISH BY NIGHT INTO NOTHING )

my death approached me
but: went on by without
recognising it was I...

i hid in the filthy alley
of a passing hour
Death now furiously searching for me

no...Here: here
no...There: there - either
this tiny piece of time

the once and once
only

but Mr. Death had missed the moment
had to return empty handed
I finding myself madly in love with

the next second. . .

**

Mr. Death elects to speak in Latin...thinks it gives him a certain je ne sais quoi...

It's always great to cheat Mr. Death and his henchman Mr. Heartattack. I swore to myself that I would love the next second with all my heart!

In addition to its inclusion among the many translations of Catullus' collected poems, Catullus 101 is featured in Nox (2010), a book by Canadian poet and classicist Anne Carson that comes in an accordion format within a box. Nox concerns the death of Carson's own brother, to which the poem of Catullus offers a parallel. Carson provides the Latin text of 101, word-by-word annotations, and "a close and almost awkward translation".

Multās per gentēs et multa per aequora vectus
adveniō hās miserās, frāter, ad īnferiās,
ut tē postrēmō dōnārem mūnere mortis
et mūtam nēquīquam alloquerer cinerem
quandoquidem fortūna mihī tētē abstulit ipsum
heu miser indignē frāter adēmpte mihī
nunc tamen intereā haec, prīscō quae mōre parentum
trādita sunt trīstī mūnere ad īnferiās,
accipe frāternō multum mānantia flētū.
Atque in perpetuum, frāter, avē atque valē.

Having been carried through many nations and over many seas,
I arrive, brother, at these wretched funeral rites
so that I might present you with the last tribute of death
and speak in vain to silent ash,
since Fortune has taken you, yourself, away from me.1
Alas, poor brother, unfairly taken away from me,
now in the meantime, nevertheless, these things which in the ancient custom of ancestors
are handed over as a sad tribute to the rites,
receive, dripping much with brotherly weeping.
And forever, brother, hail and farewell.

Catullus 101
Continue reading...
2d · 20
'SWEETNESSE READIE PENN'D'
Donall Dempsey 2d
'SWEETNESSE READIE PENN'D'
'SWEETNESSE READIE PENN'D'

The room is
flooded with time

like sunlight that has
gotten old

our faces...fishes
swimming in the shiny table.

I am totally absorbed
drawing intensely

Mandrake the Magician
Mighty Solver of Mysteries

gesturing hypnotically at
his evil twin brother Derek.

Lost in The Sinister World of
"8".

The nice lady
talks funny

like people do
in American movies.

I am told she is
my aunt from Chi-ga-go.

Well, whatya know?

She watches the lines
flow from my pen

to make the Magician
happen to the page.

"Now...that's magic!"
she says.

Her backlit hair
glows like a halo

holy as an angel
glimpsed on a Sunday.

"You're my little superhero!"
she confides in me.

She takes the first ever
colour photos of

...unbelievably us!

She even lets me
take her and the horse.

My pulse going click-
-click-click.

She can't get used to
the fact that

"...there are no toilets
either inside or out..."

The table is a brown pool
we fishing for thoughts.

We live in this
timeless mirrored moment

as if it is
all the time

that will ever
be.

We listen to the grass
growing.

After this I will never
ever see her again.

Now I stand
in the ruin of this house

as if time has
broken down

her voice all sunlight
and birds

"Gee, you
got curls

...just like a girl's!"

stroking my hair
over and over.

I wear her touch
even to this day

like a glorious
flower in my hair

her smile forever
turning into

a kiss.  

*

I was dumbfounded to stand in that room where I drew and talked with Aunt Peggy. Nothing but a ruin now that nature is reclaiming and time is clawing back from the humans. I have very few moments of her but this was the one I remember so well and she was so kind and loving to me. I remember her trying to remember a line of poetry about love and sweetness. Of course now I know it is from George Herbert. So I wrote a poem about that( for me)timeless moment. She had brought me a treasure trove of comics and I was in comic heaven! My favourites MANDRAKE THE MAGICIAN...DOCTOR STRANGE...THE PHANTOM.
She came in whilst I was drawing and just talked to me about everything and anything and watched as the drawings emerged. She was so gentle and kind and she smiled and smiled and her smile always turned into a kiss! She wore lovely dresses and talked funny and the lack of toilets was very disturbing to her as it was to me! We were both mortified!

She was amazed I could recite all of THE CREMATION OF SAM MAGEE and Hood's I REMEMBER I REMEMBER without breaking my stride in drawing. This was of course due to my Dad telling me them over and over again...he was my best book!

The quote she was trying to remember was from the last verse of Herbert's second JORDAN POEM from 1633. She made me discover George Herbert just like Nelly turned me on to Aldous Huxley's ISLAND. I just soaked them up like the process of osmosis and there they stay to this very day. I was always weaving "...myself into the sense" of who and why and what things were.

As flames do work and wind when they ascend,
So did I weave myself into the sense.
But while I bustled, I might hear a friend
Whisper, 'How wide is all this long pretence!
There is in love a sweetness ready penned:
Copy out only that, and save expense.'

Flew over to Cork for three days to catch her daughter which was quite wonderful...a river of faces flowing through people. Saw cousins I hadn't seen for over 30 years! And there I was standing in the ruin of this cottage and the room where this tiny moment happened...it all came flooding back...I was drowning in time.
Continue reading...
3d · 350
UP IN THE SKY( for W. W. )
Donall Dempsey 3d
UP IN THE SKY( for W. W. )
UP IN THE SKY( for W. W. )

Daddy was a pilotman
went to work in the sky
where bombs came from

he went  to bash the bad men
who mashed all the houses up
made big holes in the road

he told me not to be
frightened but I was and
so was teddy

I didn't like the war
it was too noisy and
kept on too long

the world shook
like an invisible giant
stomping on the ground

Mummy always said
never mind
it will be over soon

but it never was
I prayed it was
God wasn't listening

the black out
ate all the light]
teddy kept his eyes shut tight

next door went away
one morning it was
just not there

a milk bottle
stood on a doorstep
that has no house

Daddy went to work
high above the clouds
one day he never came back

Daddy had to stay
up in the sky
Mummy said he lost his way

I still think of him
living up in the sky dead
not able to come home

being dead means
you can't see someone
and they can't see you

the sky was too high
the ground was too low
so he is always up in the air

I was five
when the bombs fell
breaking the world

now I am 65
but the war still lives
on inside my head

I am older than
my daddy
could ever be

I still don't cry because
Daddy said I mustn't
I tell myself I mustn't

teddy doesn't cry because
he lost both his eyes
so he couldn't

that world now
only lives in photographs
Daddy always smiling
Continue reading...
3d · 29
"ÇA PLANE POUR MOI!
Donall Dempsey 3d
"ÇA PLANE POUR MOI!
"ÇA  PLANE POUR MOI!

You
all that Paris is!

The myth...the magic
the music of being.

Sunlight sifting
through summer leaves.

The dazzled waters
of a morning.

A forgotten orange
on a cobbled street.

Chitter-chatter of
passing Parisians.

A flock of
human birds.

A look-alike Plastic Bertrand
busks Ça Plane Pour Moi!

A crumbling wall shouts
in a strong graffiti voice

"Laisse tomber
c'est pas grave!"

Et dans
Jardin les Tuileries

Madame's tone
scolds and cajoles

"Flick-flac...flick-flac
en dedans en dehors!

Suzanne..sous-sus
sous-sus Suzanne!"

Little children
the puppets of her voice

balance on
their too spindly legs.

Old man lost
in his Tai Chi

grasps sparrow's tail
smiles to his secret self.

These and so much more
grace notes to our loving.

We the present lovers
of lovers gone before

stretching back into time
the ghosts of kisses.

We embody all
that love has been.

I kiss you
in best Bogey style

"At least
we'ill always have

'Ça plane pour moi,
moi, moi, moi, moi,

ça plane pour moi
(Hou-hou-oou-oou!)'

. . .Paris!"

*

The title comes of course from the Plastic Bertrand faux punk hit back in the days of '77 and full of crazy lyrics and mad energy. it is a French idiomatic expression which is best translated as "everything's going well for me" (literally: "it is gliding/sliding for me") or indeed " I like it!".

"That's fine by me "/"Ça plane pour moi"
Continue reading...
4d · 30
"AND WHEN DID YOU LAST SEE YOUR FATHER?"
Donall Dempsey 4d
"AND WHEN DID YOU LAST SEE YOUR FATHER?"
"AND WHEN DID YOU LAST SEE YOUR FATHER?"

you exist in the space
between breath
and breath

the space between
second
and second

thought
and thought
the interstices of being

this is where
you live
since your dying

between time
and timelessness
between forever and now

hiding you
when Death
comes knocking

"And when did you
last see your father?"
Death demands

I hold my breath
like living underwater
I deny any sight of you

Death leaves as
it arrives
in a rage

claiming
that it
owns you

and so again
I breath you
back to life

live here father
between one second
and the next

between one thought
and the next
the interstices of being

I will not let
Death
own you
Continue reading...
6d · 47
THE REVENANT
Donall Dempsey 6d
THE REVENANT
THE REVENANT  

"Ha ha!" laughed the photo
in a black and white voice
with the very ghost of me


gazing at the future
I had
now become


it was hard to accept
that this young scallywag was
someone I used to be


indeed
he is a stranger
to the me of now


finding it difficult
to get back
into his head


he was eager
to talk but I wasn't
returning him to the book

he had fallen
out of after
he had been lost for years
Continue reading...
6d · 35
THE CONSTELLATION OF THE GIRL FROM WALLA-WALLA
Donall Dempsey 6d
THE CONSTELLATION OF THE GIRL FROM WALLA-WALLA
THE CONSTELLATION OF THE GIRL FROM WALLA-WALLA

I lick her lifeline
"Oh I can see you are
going to have a wet wet life!"

she watches the tip of
my tongue crawl along her heart line
"You will have many many kisses!"

she sips her fine wine
laughs...munches
sweet onions

all I say
comes true right away
guess I got it right

cute girl from
Walla-Wall sleeping
just up against the Pacific Ocean

"Shhhh..!" says the Pacific Ocean
as it watches over
her sleep

I place DayGlo stars
on all her extremities
she becomes her own constellation

the constellation of
the Girl From Walla-Walla
being looked after by a specific Ocean

"Walla-Walla!"
the waves call to her
but she's lost inside a dream

"Are you really a real Walla-Wallan?"
I ask of her
"Yep!" she grins "I'm the real thing!"

"The only Walla-Wallan
I knew before I knew you
was a girl in a book!"

I turn the snow-dome
up-side d-own
watch it snow forever

I remember her
letter telling me
of a snowstorm she once knew

"I took a little of the snowstorm
put it in the fridge so
it could melt in July."

"The snow storm had never met
a July before
so this was its big chance!"

"When the left-over snowstorm
finally got to meet its July
it cried itself into oblivion!"

"...here. . ." her letter
pauses for ever
outside snow falls now


*



Walla Walla is the largest city in and the county seat of Walla Walla County, Washington, United States.A Walla-Wallan is a person from Walla-Walla! You just don't often meet someone who comes from what appears to be a made-up name or a South Seas island. The sound of it is delicious in itself!

Or something a baby would say learning how to talk! Wanted to write it like a little movie excerpt and to play with time and go from remembered snowdome snow to real snow falling outside...from real time to letter time and mix them up like the way they happen in the mind. Probably only ended up confusing folks!

English villages are the same...the most amazing combination of names or sounds. And sounds...I love. Together the villages of Over Wallop, Middle Wallop and Nether Wallop are known as The Wallops and run in a line roughly North to South following the line of the Wallop Brook, which has its source in Over Wallop.
Acock’s Green, Worcestershire, UK
Babes Well, Durham, UK
Bachelors Bump, Essex, UK
Backside Lane, Oxfordshire
***** Green, Kent, England
***** Cross, WestSussex
Bareleg Hill, Staffordshire, UK
Barking, Essex
****** Close, Surrey
Bedlam Bottom, Hampshire, UK
Beef Lane, Oxfordshire
Beer, Devon, UK
Beggars Bush, Sussex passed her prime
Bell End near Lickey End
Bishops Itchington, Staffs, UK
Bitchfield, Lincolnshire
Boggy Bottom, Abbots Langley, Herts, UK
***** Lane, NorthYorkshire
Bottoms Fold, Lancashire
Broadbottom, Cheshire, UK
Brown *****, Cornwall,UK
Bushygap, Northumberland, UK
Catholes, Cumbria
Catsgore, Somerset, UK
Charles Bottom, Devon, UK
Clap Hill, village in Kent, UK
Clay Bottom, Bristol, UK
**** Alley, Calow, UK
**** Bridge, Hope, Derbyshire, UK
**** Green, nr Braintree
**** Lane, Tutts Clump, Berkshire, UK
**** Law, Northumberland, UK
**** and Bell Lane, Suffolk
Cockermouth, Cumbria
Cockernhoe, nr Luton, UK
Cocking, Midhurst, West Sussex, UK
Cockintake, Staffordshire, UK
Cockpit Hill, Derbyshire, UK
Cockplay, Northumberland, UK
*****, Cornwall
Cockshoot Close, Oxfordshire
Cockshot, Northumberland, UK
Cockshutt Wood, Sheffield, UK
Cockup Lake District, Cumbria. UK
Coldwind, Cornwall, UK
Crackington Haven, Cornwall, UK
Crackpot, North Yorkshire, UK
Crapstone, Devon
Crotch Crescent, Oxford
Deans Bottom, Kent, UK
Devil’s Lapful, Northumberland, UK
***** Mount, Suffolk
Drinkstone, Suffolk, UK
******, Northumberland, UK
***** Barks, Durham, UK
***** Avenue, Derbyshire
***** Hands Lane, Lincolnshire
Feltham Close, Hampshire
Feltwell, Norfolk
Fingringhoe, Essex
Flesh Shank, Northumberland, UK
Friars Entry, Oxfordshire
Fruitfall Cove, Cornwall, UK
Fudgepack upon Humber, Humberside
Gay Street, Sussex. UK
Gays Hill, Cornwall, UK
Giggleswick, Staincliffe, Nth. Yorkshire, UK
Golden *****, Oxfordshire, UK
Gravelly Bottom Road, nr Langley Heath, Kent, UK
Great Cockup & Little Cockup, hills in The Lake District, UK
Great Horwood, Bucks, UK
Great Tosson, Northumberland
***** Lane, Shropshire
Hampton Gay, Oxfordshire, UK
Happy Bottom, Dorset
Helstone, Cornwall, UK
Hole Bottom, Yorkshire, UK
Hole of Horcum, North Yorkshire
Holly Bush, Ledbury, Herefordshire, UK
Honey **** Hill, Wiltshire
Honeypot Lane, Leicestershire
****** Road, Norwich
Horncastle, Linconshire
Horneyman, Kent, UK
Hornyold Road, Malvern Wells, UK
Horwood, Devon, UK
Jeffries Passage, Surrey
Jolly’s Bottom, Cornwall, UK
***** Close, EastSussex
Knockerdown, Derbyshire, UK
Letch Lane, Bourton-on-the-Water, The Cotswolds, UK
Lickar Moor, Northumberland, UK
Lickers Lane, Merseyside
Lickey End, Worcestershire, UK
Lickfold, West Sussex
Little Horwood, Bucks, UK
Little Bushey Lane, Hertfordshire
Long Lover Lane, Halifax
Lower Swell, Gloucestershire
Menlove Avenue, Liverpool
***** Lane, Worcestershire
Moisty Lane, Staffordshire
Nether Wallop, Hampshire
*** End, South Lancashire, UK
Nork Rise, Surrey
North Piddle, Worcestershire
Ogle Close, Merseyside
Old Sodbury, Gloucestershire
Old ***** Lane, Wiltshire
Over Peover, Cheshire, UK
Pant, Shropshire
Penistone, Sth Yorkshire, UK
Piddle River, Dorset, UK
Pork Lane, Essex
Pratt’s Bottom, Kent
Prickwillow, Cambridgeshire
Pump Alley, Middlesex
Ram Alley, Wiltshire, UK
Ramsbottom, Lancs, UK
Rimswell, East Riding of Yorkshire
Sandy *****, Hampshire
Scratchy Bottom, Dorset, UK
Shaggs, Dorset, UK
Shingaycum Wendy, Buckinghamshire
Shitlingthorpe, Yorkshire, UK
Shitterton, Dorset
Shittington,, Bedfordshire, UK
Six Mile Bottom, Cambridge, UK
Slackbottom, Yorkshire, UK
**** Lane, Merseyside
Slip End, Beds, UK
Slippery Lane, Staffordshire
Snatchup, Hertfordshire
Spanker Lane, Derbyshire.
Spitalin the Street, Lincolnshire
Splatt, Cornwall, UK
Staines, Surrey
Stow *** Quy, Cambridgeshire, UK
Swell, Somerset
The Blind Fiddler, Cornwall, UK
The Bush, Buckinghamshire
The Furry, Cornwall
The ****, Oxfordshire
Thong, Kent
Tinkerbush Lane, Oxfordshire
Titcomb, near Inkpen, Berkshire, UK
Titlington Mount, Northumberland
***** Hill, Sussex, UK
***** **, Northamptonshire
Tosside, Lancashire
Turkey **** Lane, Colchester, Essex, UK
Ugley, Essex
Upper Bleeding, Sussex, UK
Upper Chute, Hampshire, UK
Upper Dicker & Lower Dicker, East Sussex, UK
Upperthong, West Riding, Yorkshire, UK
Wash ****, Norfolk, UK
Weedon Lois, Northampton
Weedon, in the Parish of Hardwick, Buckinghamshire, UK
Weeford, Staffordshire, UK
Wet Rain, Yorkshire, UK
Wetwang, East Yorkshire
WhamBottomLane, Lancashire
Wideopen, Newcastle, UK
Willey, Warwickshire
Winkle Street, Southampton
Wormegay, Norfolk, UK
Continue reading...
7d · 36
BEAUTY O'ERSNOW'D AND BARENESS EVERY WHERE
Donall Dempsey 7d
BEAUTY O'ERSNOW'D AND BARENESS EVERY WHERE
BEAUTY O'ERSNOW'D AND BARENESS EVERY WHERE

A Christmas
with the Thames

almost freezing, then
thawing & then again

the London of 1598
asleep

under a quietness
of snow

that hides the world
from itself

as some Elizabetheans
go to steal

a theatre
silent now for a brace of years

frozen by bitter
dispute.

The playhouse dismantled
bit by bit

so that when it rises
it will become in time

The Globe
this wooden O.

Will turns his face
up to the stars

laughs
at this theatre theft

snowflakes settling
upon his eyelids

remembering when
he was all of 7

and the Christian tales
told in stained glass

are shattered
for their sins

now only white light
is to be

let in

picking up a shard
of the ****** Mary

here a fragment of
St. George.

He sticks out his tongue
tastes the snow

knows that
all things change to

begin again.

He laughs.

The ****** Mary's smile
still clasped in his hand.

*

Inspired by JAMES SHAPIRO'S COMPELLING 1599 - A YEAR IN THE LIFE OF WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE.

The 'theft" of their former theatre,The Theatre, which dismantled would become the famous wooden O. And Will watching( possibly ) when all of seven. . .the stained glass windows of his 'right goodly chapel" been smashed by a glazier who was paid 23 shillings and 8 pence for his smashing. These two images are what burned on in my mind.

I have often stood in that chapel and seen what remains of the whitewashed paintings now brought back to life. His dad had to order this whitewashing months before Will was born but by 7 Will could have been witness to the death of the coloured glass and all that was to be beheld there.

So this Midsummer's Day madness of 1571 really stated with me and forced the poem upon me.

"Popery may creep in at a glass window as well as at a door" as one William Prynne put it. The English Reformation going about its daily task to the dismay of the common folk who had to put up with the religion changing hands and changing hands yet again all in the little time of just over a quarter of a century.

Being a great lover of stained glass and its beauty this was what got me the most!

The title is from Will's Sonnet no. 5:

Those Hours that with gentle work did frame

"Beauty o'er --snowed, and bareness everywhere.
Then were not summer's distillation left
A liquid prisoner pent in walls of glass, "
Continue reading...
May 8 · 99
YOU TWO!
Donall Dempsey May 8
YOU TWO!
YOU TWO!

"You two are being quite wonderful
even if I have to say so myself"
says Life

we laugh at Life
"We have our kisses!"
we tell it

fully clothed
in a naked room
well that can be soon altered

fully naked
in a bare room
sleeping on some moonlight

tomorrow
furniture will fill this space
now it's just moonlight & us

we switch off the moon
tuck it
behind some clouds
Continue reading...
May 8 · 23
OVERWHELMED BY LOVE
Donall Dempsey May 8
OVERWHELMED BY LOVE
OVERWHELMED  BY LOVE

longing for a world
the soul
puts on its body

here
where flesh & blood conspire
the baby’s cry

locked into its body
the soul cries
at its first taste of sunlight

the soul
made flesh
overwhelmed by love

Love
the gift of being
human

my little girl
her soul still
flickering in her eyes

my God . . my little girl. . .
only just human
still mostly angel
Continue reading...
May 7 · 35
COME AND TALK TO MY FLOWERS
Donall Dempsey May 7
COME AND TALK TO MY FLOWERS
COME AND TALK TO MY FLOWERS

come and talk to my flowers
when my voice  is nothing
but the wind

my mind now
a season
season after season

dressed in only birdsong
here I will be
at the edge of summer

the depth of yes winter
here I rest
part of the universe

come
and talk
to my flowers

*


Love everything about Clandon Wood Natural Burial Grounds where I want to be when I run out of breath!
Continue reading...
May 7 · 17
TWAK!
Donall Dempsey May 7
TWAK!
TWAK!

a knife embeds itself
in the space just
by her left ear

as if the wood
gulped it...****** it
in its glint

vibrating still.
In her head
she plans dinner

she stares
at her husband
remembers how

he had come
to court her
...twak!

another knife
flashes spitefully
narrowly missing

her other ear
a little
bubble of blood

like a stud
earring blossoming
on a wobbly earlobe

'Ouch! '
she whispers
to herself guilty

at such
an over
reaction

oh how he had
excited her
her head in a spin

saying he
was in
show business

her world revolves
about him
the next knife

impregnates itself
in the space
between her legs

like a tuning fork
it hums
her excitement builds

a splinter of wood
nestles in her
left inner thigh

'Wow...nice! '
she becomes moist
the shimmy of her

spangles
as the lights catch
her

a little gasp
she faces him
boldly

afraid & un-afraid
upside down now
her world all topsy-turvy

she still so
proud of her
husband's skill

to tantalise her
his unerring
accuracy

the pride of being
(she the knife thrower's
assistant)

as well
as wife
Twak!
Continue reading...
May 6 · 30
"OH POLLYWOG MY POLLYWOG!"
Donall Dempsey May 6
"OH POLLYWOG MY POLLYWOG!"
"OH POLLYWOG MY POLLYWOG!"

he was a prince
good as any to be got
in a fairy story book

you couldn't have
written a better man
eyes like emeralds

she was a princess
although to be fair...a frog
beautiful as any green ever seen

it was their greenness
which drew them together
as well as their Irish-ness

"He is just so...ribbit ribbit!"
he blushed
to hear her say so

"****..!" she croaked
"It's just difficult to find
the right human words!"

she told him if
married they were to be
all would be change and change about

she wore his ring
in her bottom lip
he her heart's "...ribbit!"

she tried to brush up
on the lingo
Human for Frogs

come the wedding day
all was not
as it was before

he had been transformed
into the handsomest
bullfrog

and so they live
happy as a story
that needs no book

too busy loving
to be worried
about its telling

why the change
in the how it goes
from the what went before

that's easy to tell
I live under the spell
of a lively little girl

with eyes so so green
and who as it happens
just adores...frogs


*


Pollywog is of course a tadpole which i used to call her because at four she became infatuated with frogs.

She was just utterly fascinated by our frog folk and would sigh "Oh I wish I had been born a frog!" She had never seen a frog only heard of it from my telling it to her at night.
So that the first time she saw one she was amazed...."Oh my god they're real!" I guess it was as if she had met a fairy! After that there was no stopping her and she was proud to be a pollywog!
Continue reading...
May 6 · 25
GRANNY SHOCKS THE GRANDCHILDREN
Donall Dempsey May 6
GRANNY SHOCKS THE GRANDCHILDREN
GRANNY SHOCKS THE GRANDCHILDREN

me I always
wore a yellow pinafore dress
displaying my what-should-not-be-seen

or a Sgt. Pepper's jacket
serving as a dress...showing off
buttocks & knickers to great effect

moved from squat to squat
lived on hash and Mateus Rosé
***?was just...eh...there

I had loads of lads
loads of lads had me
music and *** - the twin gods

forget "I wanna hold your hand"
we were Stones fans mannnnn
sang "Lets spend the night together"

I wanted to be Juliette Gréco
read/re-read THE STORY OF O
De Sade's 120 DAYS OF *****

?morals?
yeah!yeah!yeah!
whatever

we were all of us always
trying to find ourselves
or escape from ourselves

Granda was mad
bad and gorgeous to know
like straying off the path into

the forest of a fairy story
a **** scary beast
my very own big bad wolf

an Mmmmmmmm
kind of man
"Eat me...eat me!" I'd yell at him

*** was that...what
cheered up those forever
endless rainy British afternoon


*

All the young folk saw was an old lady and they couldn't imagine the life she led when young and how the world appeared then to the youth and what they thought they could do. Youth was the new currency and ***...fashion...morals....politics...music were all thrown up in the air. "The '60's..?" she'd smirked in answer to their questions as if she were a history book rather than a real life flesh and blood individual - "...you just had to be there!"
Continue reading...
May 6 · 27
NOW THE WORLD HAS COME BETWEEN US
Donall Dempsey May 6
NOW THE WORLD HAS COME BETWEEN US
NOW THE WORLD HAS COME BETWEEN US

She lay still
(perfectly still)  

eyes wide open
like a doll’s.

Her husband
lay beside her

“eyes wide shut”
(the phrase came to her) .

She smiled secretly
to her self

imagining he (Tom
her husband)  

was “the” Tom
Cruise.

“Mmmmm! ”
she relished the thought.

“Mmmmmm! ”
she cried aloud.

“Australia! ”
she said as if answering

a question
in a quiz.

The stain growing
from his head

resembled
(for all the world)  

“Australia! ”

There was no need
to phone a friend

or go for
50/50.

“Australia! ”
she said decisively
(so sure of her self) .

“Hey...it’s ok! ”
the stranger bending over her

told her.

She believed
in the voice

in what the voice
told her.

It was warm
and husky ‘round the edges

like her Daddy
when she was little.

Her knee
pained her.

“God...” how it
pained her.

“What’s your name...love? ”
the voice cajoled her.

She had to re-focus
to make the voice visible..

...lights...coloured...
...flashing lights...

dancing
like a chat up

in a disco
under a glittering ball.

“Oh you are handsome! ”
she told him.

“I am indeed! ”
the ambulance man agreed.

“Alan Handsome...how
did you guess? ”

She felt herself
blush to her roots.

She turned her head
looking at her husband’s head

the stain that was
Australia

had imperceptibly become
South America

then a badly blurred
early map of the world.

Then she closed her eyes
and the world went away.

*

Both my friends survived this you will be pleased to know. This was related to me over tea and biscuits when she was dandling her new baby on her knee on a particularly sunny morning that was all innocence and sunshine. I didn't write at the time but the story sunk inside me and fought its way out into this telling after tunnelling through the years and years to reach the proper brain cell that would put it into words...and a synapse later that horrible night found itself trapped in my words.

The title comes from Hank Cochran's MAKE THE WORLD GO AWAY...she used always sing her own words to it and this is what was going 'round and 'round in her mind as they were having a row before the crash. It was the Jim Reeves version she liked best.
Continue reading...
May 5 · 30
DUTCH SPRING
Donall Dempsey May 5
DUTCH SPRING
DUTCH SPRING

I walk through
the 16th century
imperceptibly

passing on into
the 17th without
even knowing I had

done so and here
are Dutch people
staring at me

wondering where I've come from
I look into their eyes
long dead by now

their painted faces
gazing out of golden frames
windows into all that's passed

trying to remember
Rembrandt saying "...the light
from other's minds..."

and here is Saskia
still asleep in
a few brushstrokes

I tiptoe away
an intruder into
their long ago lives

different
yet the same
as mine

The Jewish Bride sad
to see me go
back into the bustle

of Spring
in the Amsterdam
of now
Continue reading...
May 5 · 110
DOIN' FINE!
Donall Dempsey May 5
DOIN' FINE!
DOIN' FINE!

I told you
that I love you.
I told you

what I was going to
do to you
when I got you

all to
myself
alone

I told you...
there was sudden
laughter on the line

“I think you got
the wrong
number love

but keep
talking
...you’re doin’ fine! ”
Continue reading...
May 4 · 35
IS THAT IT?
Donall Dempsey May 4
IS THAT IT?
IS THAT IT?

Time runs out
warps into itself
strata after strata

diminishing into
a dot before me
that I vanish into

Future-Past-the Now
all one
and the same

so this is what
Death is
I'm not impressed

the silence solidifies
Memory contrives
to put the world back

together like
a cut-out
Dada collage

a postcard blue sky
hastily assembled
against some remembered

building famous for something
or other and
a photo of you

ripped out of
an I don't know
stuck in place

glue seeping
around edges
like a white blood

Life is
an Hannah Höch
photomontage

Time congeals
like a fried egg with
a ciggie stuck in its yoke

I laugh at memory's
vain attempts
"Don't bother!" I tell it

in a voice like
the white space
between written words

the world swirls anti-
clockwise down
the plug hole of reality

If this is Death
as I say I'm not
impressed

*

Jan had fallen and hurt her head at Valletta...a great big blue ****** bruise. I was very worried about her and she awoke in the early hours of the morning. I got up to make her tea. I had a very sore throat....could hardly swallow my own saliva. I was waiting for the kettle to boil and idly bite into a slice of bread with delicious Maltese marmalade. I had just made the tea when I found I was unable to swallow the last bite...it got stuck in my throat and I was busy losing consciousness. Time was running away from me and everything was going black. Jan said I just collapsed and crashed to the floor...all I knew was that the world had gone away and everything was dark. Our Maltese friend said that the famous arch in Gozo that collapsed had collapsed from the bottom...."...like a too large lady on too high high heels." I was obviously doing my charades impression of the Gozo arch meeting its end. I too was busy meeting my end....but just before the world was cut from under my feet I dashed a slurp of tea into me which must have in turn helped to make the bolus of bread go down just in time. When consciousness lapped back into my skull I was only aware of water in my mouth and coming out of my nose....I thought I was drowning in the dark and had no notion how I had fallen into such a notion of an ocean. Jan was beside her self and then beside me as I made it back just in time to crawl back into life and the being of me...
Continue reading...
May 4 · 33
FINE YOUNG THING
Donall Dempsey May 4
FINE YOUNG THING
FINE YOUNG THING

“Oh, I was...a fine young thing! ”
“Ya shoulda seen me then! ”

“Lindyhopping Lindy! ”
“Dat’s wot de’s called me! ”

“God! I was good! ”
“I was better than good! ”

“I was to be dug...dig! ”

I laugh as she jive talks me.

“Here...ya don’t believe me! ”
“I’ll show ya! ”

And she proceeds to
show me
how & wow!

Flinging her fragile frame
into a crazy crazy dance routine
...*******!

God! She nearly gives me
a heart attack just watching her.

Doesn’t look a day over 40(she’s a nifty sixty) .

She busts a move(never breaks sweat)
dances me off my feet(I bust a gut) .

Bless her.. little cotton socks.
“Well, young fellow...was I lying? ”

“You...you’re(I gasp) “...the bee’s knees.. the cat’s pyjamas

I try to catch my breath
(it went that away)
I nurse a hernia.

“Ah, you young guys these days
you just ain’t the same! ”

“Why, me & Jim would dance for hours! ”

“We was the best jumpin’ jivers! ”

“Shoulda seen us dancing to“Jeeperscreepers! ”
“Man...we was something else! ”

Then she goes... makes us both
a nice cup of tea

with a dash of brandy in it for me
(“Thought ya needed it! ”) .

Spring waltzes in and
dances with the curtains.

Louis Jordan sings:

“There ain’t nobody here
but us chickens

...there ain’t nobody here

but

us! ”
Continue reading...
May 4 · 28
THE MUSIC OF WHAT HAPPENS
Donall Dempsey May 4
THE MUSIC OF WHAT HAPPENS
THE MUSIC OF WHAT HAPPENS

The sun a crazy crayoned
yellow swirl

with a sky so blue it has
completely used up the blue crayon.

This is Memory’s drawing of...
...a moment from 1972

complete with furze declaring:
“WE ARE YELLOW TOO!”

I sit stick-person-like upon an Irish hill
upon which perches the old English graveyard.

I read to English soldiers from 1872
MARY BARTON and  NORTH AND SOUTH and such like.

A captive audience of broken Celtic crosses.

They listen with all of themselves.

They listen through wild flowers and grasses
holding fast to the sound of my living

voice.

And when sun showers
Interrupt the text of my breath

I climb inside
some tumble-down-tomb

and read so that
even the rain stops

to listen & then

I freewheel down the hill
back to the world of tea.

My dead soldiers
eagerly awaiting

tomorrow’s chapter.  

*

Reading for my Leaving Cert. If you have ever seen the John Huston version of Joyce's THE DEAD then...you have seen the entrance to this graveyard. and a few of its graves covered in snow..it's briefly glimpsed as the voiceover narrates the beautiful passage "...: snow is falling all over Ireland...."
Continue reading...
May 2 · 38
THE THINNESS OF A SHADOW
Donall Dempsey May 2
THE THINNESS OF A SHADOW
THE THINNESS OF A SHADOW

from the very last time
I saw you
to the story

of your death
unable to comprehend
that you do not exist

you to me
are living
yet

you an early morning
silhouette
looking at clouds

as was your want
a living
breathing entity

every moment
now made more
precious than the last

I hold you so
in thought
refusing to let you go

and so
it is
always so

your footstep
as you
cross the floor

whistling Wish
you were
here

the story
of your death
I refuse to believe in

as if it happened
to a someone else
another Brian...not mine

You stepping through
the door
so full of light

stepping through time
"Come on Bud...
I gotta go!"

your death
the shibboleth
I can not utter

you forever always
this
early morning silhouette
Continue reading...
May 2 · 37
JULIAN IS WRITING A POEM
Donall Dempsey May 2
JULIAN IS WRITING A POEM
JULIAN IS WRITING A POEM      

"The thud, thud of a horse's hoof
does not alarm fish."  

MIND UNDER WATER - 1883
Richard Jefferies



Fishes flee him.

They can feel his thoughts
touch them.

Here, Creux Harbour
on the Island of Sark.

Mummy fish tries not to laugh
as her little darlings dart...

It's only a poet!"
she tells her younglings

"thinking thoughts
they won't hurt you.

Julian's vibrations
pass through them.

"It's what poets do
before they turn the world  into words"

The little fish listen
with open mouths.

"As far as I can tell...it's a Julian
one of the cleverest kind one can find

a man composed of equal parts
wit and charm

an all shall be well and
all shall be well type of guy."

Julian is thinking
of nothing

but horses.
Horses.

The fish don't
even get a look in.

He sees the great shires
being swum in the harbour.

Such a magnificence
of being

decanted from land
to sea

the great hooves
treading water

free to be themselves
enjoying their day at the sea's side.

Julian is alive
with this image

the sheer
awe of it all.

The fishes think
nothing of it.

They are used to horses
galloping among them.

It's the vibrations
of the poet's thoughts

that tickles them.

"But our Mam..?""
a small fry ventures

"...there are no horses
here....and now?"

"Ahhh that doesn't bother poets
ya see...they see

both what is there and not there
or what may be!"

She quotes the great 16th century fish
"Nothing is so but thinking make it so!"

Later, at the Candie Gardens
on another island altogether

Julian sits, sips...
a double espresso.

And again.
A double espresso..

We see the words flow
onto the page

charged with the grandeur
of the great shires

as the little fishes look on
amused at the poet's

coffee coloured thoughts.


**

We left Julian Stannard at the table as we went to pursue the museum that awaited us inside. I jokingly commanded Julien to use the time to write a poem. And when we came back to him...indeed he had. A great poem about writing with the sun and horses swimming in the bay at Sark. One felt humbled by his ability and the ease with which over a double expresso he could write so brilliantly. I was hoping that some of that ease would rub off on me but alas no.

I was like a little raft watching an ocean liner pass by in the night.  

All hail the Julian who shall be 'the poet' for ever hereafter.
Continue reading...
May 1 · 38
"BEWARE THE DONALL DEMPSEY MY SON!"
Donall Dempsey May 1
"BEWARE THE DONALL DEMPSEY MY SON!"
"BEWARE THE DONALL DEMPSEY MY SON!"

the frog slid
slowly down
my throat

its legs sticking out of
my mouth...
still kicking

the world
was running away
into the final darkness

my eyes were robbed
of trees and sun
the day being stolen from me

"Death by frog!"
how unlikely
a dying

the bullies all
short-trousered
lads like me

the moment sculpted
from the sunlight
of 1963

then either the frog gave
a desperate last minute kick
or I silently yelled

and expelled
friend frog who
having escaped death

by swallowing
hopped it
lost itself in the long grass

perhaps the horrible tale
of down-the-gullet
is told still

to its descendants
far removed from
that sunny day.

"Better watch out..." Mamma Frog
would make her voice shiver
making her little tiddlers tremble

with trepidation
"...or the Donall Dempsey
will get you!"

*

I was having a bad day....nothing going my way....but still Kim Moore  managed to wring this out of me in her wonderful writing workshop. She applied a Chinese burn to my mind and out popped this in a seven and a half minute sprint of the mind. I was halfway through reliving the trauma of a frog being shoved down my throat to gales of laughter when I suddenly thought "What about the poor frog? How did he cope?"

What did he tell the other frogs and how in the world of frogs it became the tallest of tall tales and my name entered the lexicon of frog horror stories that have been passed down through generations of frog families despite being the innocent victim! All the frog heard in its terrification was my name chanted over and over again in great grievous glee "Ha ha ha...Donall Dempsey!"

Me and friend frog were in this tormenting together. But despite all this my name has gone down in frog history as if I were a Grendel or a Grendel's mother or a Jabberwocky. Just say Donall Dempsey and see what the reaction is...faster than a Basho plop and splash.

Still have nightmares about it! Another time they took off my pants and I had to run all the way home bottomless. In memory no one can hear you scream.

But no one thought of the poor frog...except me. I hope he didn't think bad of me...it wasn't my fault.

Frog saved both our lives by kicking free....his own and mine as I was being held down and could struggle. He saved me from choking on him and I probably gave one last choking cough to expel him from inside of me.

When in France I couldn't even look at a frog's leg without choking.

Ahhh but a bullied frog in the throat is worth a poem in the mind. Both friend frog and myself surviving to tell the tale.
Continue reading...
Apr 30 · 36
...plus ça change, plus ça reste le meme. . .
Donall Dempsey Apr 30
...plus ça change, plus ça reste le meme. . .
...plus ça change, plus ça reste le meme. . .


dawn tiptoes
over the horizon
me at the washing line

******* after pretty *******
adorn my line
the dawn blushes

I bend to the basket
***** after ***** after *****
push my hair behind my ear

ooops the twins are up
I blow a kiss
to the dawn...yawn

"Good boy...good boy!"
I cajole the lads
sobs cease at my voice

think the world of them
make a world for them
their chuckles...their gurgles...my delights

ouch my back hurts
snatched coffee whilst twins sleep
skip through last month's COSMO

"Oh gallant maker of babies!"
I address fat lump clamped in duvet
"Get...the f*. . .up!"
Continue reading...
Apr 28 · 34
SHALL WE DANCE. . .
Donall Dempsey Apr 28
SHALL WE DANCE. . .
SHALL WE DANCE. . .

take the skeleton
by the hand and
we dance

it is a gloriously
sunny day
of childhood

the skeleton
just grins and
I sing I'm all shock up

mmm mmm
yeah yeah
yeah

can tell
Mr. Skelton is
well into Elvis

swings its pelvis
rattles its bones
"Go Skeletoney goooo!"

my da yells
"Donall son
leave the ****** skeleton alone!"

"Plant ya now
dig ya later!"
I jive talk him

the skeleton
comes to a stand still
dangles from a wire

out of his skull
I leave my Da's
army sports stores

I always amazed
that this
skeleton was once

a man
as alive
as me

years later
the army
thinks the same

and plastic
replaces
bone

he's finally buried
with full military honours
flag draped coffin

3 volley salutes
scattering the crows
a future he

could never know
become human
for the last time

then the boy
I was
becomes the man I am

lighting a candle
for my former dancing partner
"Rest easy Mr. Bones...rest easy!"


I wrote of 'him' way back in 2007 and then lost the poem so this year. remembering the lost poem, I wrote this version. Then I lost this version. And then I found the old version and finally the new version again! I found it interesting to see the different ways of coming into a poem...same facts but a different trajectory as one enters the emotional atmosphere of the poem.

*

COME DANCING


I take the skeleton’s hand
& man...do we dance?

I clasp his bony hand in mine
give him a high five and dude...we jive!

No one can touch us now
(we’re in a world of our own) .

We shake, rattle ‘n’ roll...yeah!
Shake, rattle ‘n’ roll
(then we)
*** into dat kitchen ‘n’ rattle ‘em pots ‘n’ pans
Den den den...den den den!

The skeleton flashes me a toothy grin.

“Man...you the one...you the one...what a groove...we’re in! ”

The transistorised air is alive as song after song drives me on.

The skeleton don’t break sweat!
Me...my scalp prickles...sweat trickles down my spine.

Sunlight spills in the window
& the dust motes go wild.

The skeleton places a bony hand on my clavicle
& I place my hand on his sacroiliac.

We waltz eye socket to eye socket
& patella to patella.

Gene Kelly sings:

"What a great day it’s been... what a rare mood I’m in
Why it’s... almost like being in love!"

He’s a fine medical specimen.

He dangles from a thread in his head
& the slightest breeze moves him
...gets him going.

I call him Mr. Bo Jangles.

He lives in my Dad’s army sport stores.

From the inner sanctum of his room
my Dad’s army voice booms:

”Donall...leave that ****** skeleton alone! ”

And goes back to counting his *****.

The ledger grows & grows.
(He mutters & mumbles to himself) .

“*****...soccer...50? ...50! ”
“*****... rugby...50? ...50! ”
“*****...medicine...50? ...50! ”

he intones as if chanting a mantra.

I shuffle out...trying to be cool
(in this heat?)

“Yo, see ya later Bo! ”

Years later I see him
in a tiny newspaper article.

Apparently the Army
realise they’ve got a real life skeleton on their hands

& decide to do the decent thing
(remembering the man he’d been)

& bury him

with full military honours

flag draped coffin
& shots fired into the air to scare the crows away.

I wish I could have...been there.

Say my goodbyes.

I smile & whisper
a little prayer:


”Yo, see ya later...Bo! ”
Continue reading...
Apr 26 · 67
THE ONLY WAY OF LOOKING AT A BIRD
Donall Dempsey Apr 26
THE ONLY WAY OF LOOKING AT A BIRD
THE ONLY WAY OF LOOKING AT A BIRD

( "...it is an astonishment to be alive, and it behoves you to be astonished..." John Donne )

she looked at the bird
with all of her self
as if by some alchemy

of thought
she flew into
its shape

as it became the air
her mind opening
its wings to the sky

the house now
a little blue egg
far far below her

her voice curving
into a beak
that flung its being

into the song
of self
scrawled across a sky

becoming sunset
so that becoming
human again

was a grief
that could only be
expressed in birdsong


*


My little one being astonished when a bird came and stood beside her as just another friendly being. They both stood there looking at each other and then the bird flew away and her mind flew away after it.
Continue reading...
Apr 26 · 36
A STITCH IN TIME
Donall Dempsey Apr 26
A STITCH IN TIME
A STITCH IN TIME

Memory
passes through
the eye of the needle

I purse my lips
coat the thread
with spit

one eye
closed
one eye open

pass it like a baton
to my mother sewing
on  a loose button

the needle
a little silver fish
dashes in

and out
a frayed
shirt cuf

I walk down a street
in New York
as memory

whisks me back
to an Irish kitchen
a kettle whistling

and my mother cursing
"Ahhh son can you
thread that for me!"
Continue reading...
Apr 26 · 32
COME ANOTHER DAY
Donall Dempsey Apr 26
COME ANOTHER DAY
COME ANOTHER DAY

"****...****..shishishi!"
whispers the rain
in Albanian



It sounds like "She...she...sheeee."

In Maltese it is....
xita which sounds an awful lot like "****...ahhh!"

In Korean it is bi which is pronounced "***."

I was trying to catch to the sound of rain falling on tatch and the Albanian came nearest.

Knowledge comes courtesy of a Maltese taxi driver.

Idioms for raining from other countries are something else!

In Irish we say "Tá sé ag caitheamh sceana gréasaí."
Or it is raining cobbler's knives!"

In Greece it is raining chair legs...

In Czech it is raining tractors...

In South Africa it is raining old women with clubs.

In Portugal, Brazil, and other Portuguese-speaking countries..."It's raining frogs' beards."

In Denmark it rains "shoemaker boys/shoemaker apprentices. In 1758 a shoemaker - Carl Jepsen - hurled three boys out the window from the 2nd floor for not doing their work properly. they all died)

Or nearer to the Irish:..."It's raining pocketknives,"

Now ya know



I know I know "cats and dogs' but I was going after ones I didn't know...that were common in those countries but surprising to us.

The poem I wrote about not having my grandfather's legs had the sheep talking in their own language of the countries they were found in so that started me off.

In Korea for example bees don't buzzbuzz buzz but rather go...get this...****. Ahhh isn't language a glorious thing so it is so it is.
Continue reading...
Apr 25 · 40
"WHAT DE. . ?"
Donall Dempsey Apr 25
"WHAT DE. . ?"
"WHAT DE. . ?"

the chairs eyed each other up
suspiciously
each waiting for the other to make a move

the table just stood there
not wanting
to get involved

the painting
turned its face
to the wall

the window pretended
to look
outside

the door thought
it was an open &
shut case

the phone
went to say something but
changed its mind

"Tick..!" commented the clock
but never tocked
shut its mouth again

then the first chair
laughed
breaking the tension

the chairs
all amigos once again
thick as thieves

the room relaxed
the flowers smiled
the curtains danced with a breeze

". . .tock!" said the clock
almost
blue in the face

when I walked in
I could sense something had happened
that hadn't happened

the room said nothing
I looked at the room looking at me
the room stayed schtum
Continue reading...
Apr 25 · 402
DEATH OF A PERFECT UNIVERSE
Donall Dempsey Apr 25
DEATH OF A PERFECT UNIVERSE
DEATH OF A PERFECT UNIVERSE

puddles
capture
stars

throw them
at our feet
where we with each

hurrying footstep
destroy each
perfect universe.

and now that
we have gone
(lovers eager to be home)

puddles
patiently
reform

wrestle stars to the ground
(trapped in the rain’s
shattered mirrors)

reflect yet
another
perfect universe

that trembles
at the approach
of a pair of bright

newly
red
stilettos
Continue reading...
Apr 24 · 31
THE STORM OF 1929
Donall Dempsey Apr 24
THE STORM OF 1929
THE STORM OF 1929

he carves the storm
into the wood
gouging its very essence

so that when
the storm ceases
it exists still in memory

it comes alive again
the wood speaking
in the great wind's voice

wooden waves
crashing over
wooden rocks

a seagull captured
in two swift strokes
flies above it all

all who witness
his wooden storm
live it at first hand

his old hands
trap the storm
carves it into the mind
Continue reading...
Apr 24 · 29
LIGHTLY CHILD LIGHTLY
Donall Dempsey Apr 24
LIGHTLY CHILD LIGHTLY
LIGHTLY CHILD LIGHTLY

the wind is reading
Aldous Huxley's ISLAND
dropped among the hollyhocks

the wind speed reads
skips entire sections
a fat fly walks over the title

an obese raindrop falls
upon the author's name then
another & another &. . .

ISLAND
turns to mulch
raindrops batter the book

it comes apart
at his touch
islands of words remain

"...two thirds of all sorrow
is homemade and so far
as the universe is concerned..."

the rest is lost
but he can fulfil the words
". . . unnecessary. . ."

now here at your grave
my fingertips trace
the curves of your name

as a lover might
trace the taut
muscles of a back

a ladybird pauses on
the H of Huxley
as if learning its letters

their metal inlay
glinting in the sun
"...it isn't a matter of forgetting..."

your words scattered
across the years
"...what one has to remember is..."

"...how to remember and yet
be free of

the past..."

I still grieve my lost book
eaten by the weather but
glowing in my mind

I laugh and tell your grave
"Give us this day our
Daily Faith but...

...deliver us
Dear God
from Belief."
Continue reading...
Apr 23 · 35
HER FIRST AUTUMN
Donall Dempsey Apr 23
HER FIRST AUTUMN
HER FIRST AUTUMN

I watch her
try to capture
things in words

her first Autumn
her eyes try to accommodate
what her mind sees

"The Autumn
is rusting
the trees!"
Continue reading...
Apr 23 · 29
PASSING STRANGE
Donall Dempsey Apr 23
PASSING STRANGE
PASSING STRANGE

Rose, arose & having risen:
...was angry.

'You never call me
by my name

only love & darling.'

'A rose by any other name
would smell as sweet! '
I quoted.

'That's neat! '
she sweetly smiled.

'That's Shakespeare! '
I whispered in her ear

and kissed her
sweet sweet smile.

(Each reflected in the other's eye) .

'Oh, quote me that kiss again! '
she sighed.

'How I do love thee...! '
I cried.

'...let me count the kisses! '
she replied.

My lovely darling

Rose.

*

PASSING STRANGE is from Shakespeare's Othello...when the big guy tells his tales to Dessie and she finds them not only strange but...passing strange. I always thought of a series of inns along a journey...the first was the Ye Olde Strange Inn...then the next one was Ye Really Weirdy Strange Inn...and then surpassing all that... Ye Olde Passing Strange Inn. The Passing Strange of the title refers to the fact that the poem begins with the most strange off the wall wonderful brawl of a row and ends in the most sublime *******!
I had merely asked her(as many times before) 'Do you want a cup of tea, love? ' And all hell exploded until I could understand where she was coming from and kiss it better. Using 'love' in almost every address to a person is an Irishism that is visible to others but invisible to me as...I'm Irish. I don't hear my Irish accent until someone comments on it and its little pecularities. So, my mother would say:
' Make us a cup of tea, love? ' And I say: 'Yeah, love! ' Or a shopkeeper would tell you that that was: '...only a shilling love for all them nice juicy tomatoes love! ' And if you hurt someone, you'd say:
' Sorry, love! ' Or: 'I love you...love! ' It's like spice or flavouring... invisible until it's not there! '
Even if you are unhappy with what a person is doing and tell them in no uncertain terms...so...then the sentence construction is likely to be: 'Ahhhh for fu's sake... love! ' You still put the 'love' on the end of the sentence to show that it is their present actions that you are displeased with and that despite all this they still are your 'love! '
Frieda used to tell me that she loved being my 'love! ' And indeed if I didn't say it she would pick me up on it or ask if I didn't love her anymore! Her full name was Frieda Rose so I would call her so or just Frieda or just Rose or 'Frieda Rose love! ' Try it yourself...it's very hard to be annoyed with someone when you are calling them 'love.' In my part of the country even men would call each other love(in Yorkshire in England they still do as well) and all the normal courtsey and manners are extended to a gentleman as well as to a lady. That's why it's called common courtsey! This can be seen at the end of the Beatles YELLOW SUBMARINE where the guys make an appearance as themselves and not just their cartoons! John is looking worred and Paul asks him: 'What's the matter John, love? '
This time however Frieda went berserk and said 'Don't call me love...I'm not your love! ' It turned out that I had begun to dropp her name more and more and now she was permantently called just 'Love! ' to show how dear she was to me. There was not other word for her except 'love.' She was love itself to me...the very embodiment of the word. Turns out a guy who treated her real bad and cheated on her a lot would always call her love to make it easier for him to cover up his cheating. If everyone was love then he couldn't make a mistake. One day he broke his own rule and called Frieda Rose...Dolly!
Big mistake...they broke up and as he left he told her of his foolproof system of using 'love' for whatever woman he was with. She always hated it after that and until I came along she wouldn't let anyone call her that. She said I said it so differently and it sounded lovely in an Irish accent and I said it like I meant it! That day she had been thinking of him for some reason and all the hurt came back and I just happen to say: 'Do you want a cup of tea, love! '
My stepping into Shakespeare diffused the situation and we started playing around with the launguage and delighting in the words.
Frieda Rose didn't know much Shakespeare until she met me and then it was impossible...not to. just by the process of osmosis you would soak up my passion for the bard. She was just bored and didn't like him anyway but gradually she came to see what I saw in the guy...like.. wow! She gradually soaked up lots of poems and poets and became quite an expert in whom she liked. She had just gotten into the Brownings and this also makes an appearance at the end of the poem.
I brushed back her hair and kissed her on her neck just under her ear and she swooned and sighed 'Oh, quote me that kiss again! ' She was now fully in Shakespearean mode and her feeling and the language got married at the point and out came this lovely natural line. I wish I had wrote it(I only report it!) and I bet Shakey wouldn't have minded coming up with it himself. Today it is still one of my favourite lines of poetry and I still wish I had wrote it. ******* it...she had
out-Shakespeare'd me!
And so I had to write a poem to get my favourite line into it and so PASSING STRANGE came to be. I love reading it even if an audience don't get it or like it that particular night.
It makes me go 'Mmmmmmmmmmm! ' and I get a chance to say:
'Oh, quote me that kiss again! '
Everytime I speak that line...I enter forever the timeless time of that kiss and that's the only moment that exists!
Continue reading...
Apr 23 · 39
MEANAGERIE A TOI
Donall Dempsey Apr 23
MEANAGERIE A TOI
MEANAGERIE A TOI

Ring! Ring!
“Hello...who?”
“F* you!”

“What the . . ?”
“Sorry...that’s Secherazade!”
“Who. . .?”

“My cockatoo!”
“Oh!”
“Fyou!Fyou!F*you!”

“Slurp! Slurp!”
and an even bigger: “. . .slurp!”
“What the. . .?”

“Sorry...that’s Harry!”
“Harry?”
“My Labrador!”

“Down boy...down I say!”
“Purrr...purrr!”
“Are you purring?”

“No...that’s Brat!”
“Brat?”
“My cat!”

“Brat!”
“Your cat!”
“Anyway...how are you?”
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Apr 23 · 29
!!!!!!HOPPY BIRD DAY!!!!!!!
Donall Dempsey Apr 23
!!!!!!HOPPY BIRD DAY!!!!!!!
!!!!!!!HOPPY BIRD DAY!!!!!!!

just shy of
almost 21 inches high
she perches on my arm

sobs into my shirt cuff
her 4th birthday looms large

for her
& us
...the big 04!

she cries she doesn't
want to grow old
& die!

fears her birthday as
the Grim Reaper himself
calling in person

"Birthdays..." I console her
are just like breathing
in&out

stop 'em & - you're gone!
you don't have birthdays then
no more you!

birthdays are how you
keep making you
happen!

my little eyassvall tears & snot
brightens up at this
sniffs & sniffles

I tell her
you are the sky
all endless & blue

time the wings
that lets you
fly

Death, snickers
standing by my shoulder
"Ahhh...ya old haggard ya

that's a nice pretty lie
to dry
a nestling's tears."

I watch her fly
into the endless blue
of her self

smile as she
embraces
her now

I hop on one
leg
hoppty hop

"HOPPY BIRD DAY!"
I shout against the glare
of time and sun

she squeals
excited now
as to the who

she is
going to
be

both of us
hopping down
the path together
Continue reading...
Apr 22 · 28
WELL, KISS MY POPLITEAL FOSSA!
Donall Dempsey Apr 22
WELL, KISS MY POPLITEAL FOSSA!
WELL, KISS MY POPLITEAL FOSSA!

I remember the golden
tassels of my dress
touching the back

of my knees
as I was kissed
for the very first

time bent over
in a clinch as if
we were statuary

the tassels' touch
exquisite in itself
much more sensual

than the actual kiss was
I wondered( his tongue
dancing with my tonsils)if:

there was a name for that
sort of thing
(the back of the knees I mean)

"Ok Freddie!" I commanded
seeing as I seemed
to be in command here

"...that's quite enough of that!"
shattered he reluctantly
took his tongue out of my cheek

"Cheeky ******!" I thought
"should never have let him go
...that far!"

crestfallen he
stammered
a sorry

"You won't tell my mother
...will you?"
hid his ******* with his topper

I went in at once
and asked of father
"Is there a name

for the back of the knees?"
"Of course there is my love!
It's your popliteal fossa!"

I tingled to my toes
having discovered my first
erogenous zone

and knowing
that one day
I would become a doctor

*

Just as the inside of your elbow...the crook of your elbow ...the elbow pit is..is called the "antecubital fossa".
And that cute little bit just under your nose and above your lip is called...the philtrum.
The suprasternal notch (fossa jugularis sternalis), also known as the jugular notch, is another part of human anatomy that is known as an erogenous zone but remains nameless. It is that large, visible dip at the base of the throat.
And that bony part of your elbow is an olecranon which I should know as I broke mine very badly. I was known as "the elbow" and doctors would almost drool over how bad it was and forget their professionalism and go "Shitttttttttt!"
Continue reading...
Apr 22 · 48
ANAM CARA ( Soul Friend )
Donall Dempsey Apr 22
ANAM CARA ( Soul Friend )
ANAM CARA
( Soul Friend )

the sun bursts
into the tiny room
seating itself on the sofa

the water boils
whistles impatiently
waiting for the human to make tea

she feels like an object
in a room full of objects
an object cursed with consciousness

milk gone sour
out of cigarettes
impossible to live without cigarettes

dashes barefoot
to the opening shops
out of her favourite brand

an impossibly old man
almost a living cartoon
turns the handle of a barrel *****

as if they had
being beamed down
from another century

the young Irishman
(she had heard him talking to)
the monkey in the red fez

when he was not
reading Hamsun's
The Hunger

the monkey yanking at
his manacled left foot
when he wasn't dancing

"Ahhh Anam Cara!"
he comforts the monkey
"Me monkey too in Chinese Zodiac!"

The Merry Widow Waltz
wafting above a tree
its music entangled in its branches

the barrel *****
erupts incongruously into
Abba of all things

she watches the Irishman
now from her bedroom window
a figure trapped in a painting

he reads all day
until the light declines
to help him

she wonders at what thoughts
roam inside his head
what images grow there

dusk comes quickly
as if it's in a hurry
to get day done

tiny stars nail the night
to the frozen sky
before morning tears it down

the Irishman
observes the lights go on
in all the windows  

he appears to be
outside of time
she wishes she had spoken to him

"Ahhh Anam Cara!"
she mimics his voice
comforting herself

not knowing what
the words mean
her voice touching their tenderness

he leaves
his Hunger behind him
on the bench

she pockets it
falls asleep reading it
dreaming of him

*

This was a park in Rotterdam as the evening declined and night came on...I was a very lonely young man. I was reading Knut Hamsun's THE HUNGER and just letting life stream past me as if I were a rock in a river. Then a barrel ***** with a monkey hove into sight and sound. I had never thought to have encountered such a thing as I had only seen them in films and it was as if it had squeezed through some wormhole and escaped into this future. It played all operetta interspersed with the hits of the day so surprising to have the Merry Widow one moment and then Dancing Queen the next. The old man looked as if he had been sculpted from pure sadness as did his monkey who wore a red fez and a dashing scarlet waistcoat. The incongruity of meeting a dancing manacled monkey dressed in human attire was not lost on me. It was like being in a scene from The Third Man and I expected to glimpse Mr. Lime at any moment as the night came on.

In the morning a barefooted woman from one of the flats across the road came and got some cigs and milk and stopped to look at me as I talked to the sad monkey in Irish. She smiled fleetingly and dashed back to her home. I had a sudden flash that maybe she was my soul mate and we were doomed to miss each other in that one mad moment. So I imagined her loneliness in her room and my loneliness in this park and how we we would never encounter each other ever again. And so my soul mate was to be this poor monkey as if we both recognised that we were both tied to this mysterious moment by a fake gold chain that let us dance but never escape the ***** grinder. I forgot the book when I was told the park was closing and the man and his monkey had long gone. I still had not finished it and it was only years later that I finally got around to its final pages.
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Apr 21 · 30
AND ALL FOR NOTHING
Donall Dempsey Apr 21
AND ALL FOR NOTHING
AND ALL FOR NOTHING

the house waited for him
like the faithful dog
he had not got

"Hello...hello!" said the house
smiling
with all of itself

"Welcome!" said the mat
his own home at last
the silence filled up with his footsteps

"Read me...no read me!"
the books on his shelves
argued amongst themselves

made himself a G&T
watched the sunset
like it was TV

slowly the night
crept through the house
found him asleep in the chair

he startled awake
saw her smiling at him
from an old photo

he turned the photo
face down. . .a tear ran
into the edge of his moustache

"And all for nothing..."
he told himself
"...all for nothing!"


*

I never got to see this fabulous house. I met him in a pub and we just fell into talking...then he'd have to get a train back to Manchester to "my house!" But somehow the house in words was greater than any house he could show me. He was Greek and would always tell me that his wife was "the King of my house!" Because his English was not good( learnt from movies )he had picked up the King of Siam's "etc., etc., etc." phrase in order to fill in the thoughts suggested but unavailable to him in words. Every time I see this fabulous film I remember him and how his wife was "the King of my house and my heart!"
The big dream was to own his own home. Then he got married and his wife died in childbirth so now the big dream( ever since he was a little kid )was here but....empty.

I prefer the "not knowing" in the poem. The elements in the poem are the delight in having the dream house and then for the sorrow and the emptiness you have to imagine the rest...asking the reader to complete the poem with their imagination. An air of mystery...suffice it to say...something soul destroying has happened but the wondering what it is...is...another poem.
Continue reading...
Apr 21 · 36
LADYBIRD SUMMER
Donall Dempsey Apr 21
LADYBIRD SUMMER
LADYBIRD SUMMER

was it back somewhere
in the January of '76
that I was 'Wide Eyed and

Legless" and becoming
pregnant without
even knowing.

totally in love with
Amen Corner
making love to it

now July swelters
a terrible time
to carry a baby

and heavy shopping
up three flights of stairs
each step crushing

hoards and hoards
of ladybirds
over and over

the roads
melting
sticking to my footsteps

"Sun, sun sun -  here it comes!"
now blasts from
the tiny transistor

Summer heatwave
wave of nostalgia
for the Beatles of my youth

but fancying
Steve Harley
head over heels

even my soon-to-be born
child somersaults
inside me

I will call him Steve
or Stevie if it's a girl
father now only a photograph
Continue reading...
Apr 21 · 35
RUNNING TOWARDS THE LIGHT
Donall Dempsey Apr 21
RUNNING TOWARDS THE LIGHT
RUNNING TOWARDS THE LIGHT

fear of War
walks upon the air
strides across a countryside

like a gigantic
demonic **** in Boots
a Grimm tale let loose

upon a world
that can only offer
in its defence

the beauty of this spiderweb
thrown across
the space between

hedgerow and fence
this the last sunset
that will ever know "Peace...

. . .in our time."
I fear Mr. Chamberlain
has got it - wrong

Herr ****** has caught the bus
a hawk hovers
in its beauty

I sit making
its jesses
and leashes

already I can see
I stand in the ruins
of my life

an ordinary man
turning into
history

War invisible
yet totally tangible
its hand touching

my landscape
an ancient chalk man
holding the gates open

the what will
be...will...be
a sunset caught

in a spiderweb
the last time
I ever was me
Continue reading...
Apr 21 · 33
I HAVE NO GIFTS TO BRING
Donall Dempsey Apr 21
I HAVE NO GIFTS TO BRING
I HAVE NO GIFTS TO BRING

I bring him back
bits of the world

like a child would.

Broken green glass
among the grass

like grass on fire
with green.

A cat that yawns
and every time it yawns

it has the bark
of an invisible dog

sound and sight
synchronised for a laugh.

A swan sitting on
a park bench

as if it were a park bench
for SWANS ONLY.

All these useless
bits of broken world

that my father will never see
I carry them back in words

like a child trying to capture
the sea in a blue bucket

trying not to spill a single thing
that's seen

back to Nass
General Hospital.

Offer them up like treasure
as only the child I was

could.

And then and now
your smile

treating them
as wondrous to behold

"Is the world so?"

"It is so!"
I say

both as man and boy.

The glass grins
shining in the sun

like a little green
fire.

A cat caught
mid yawn

by some ventriloquist
dog in a lonely backyard.

A swan who thinks
it's human.

You smile
at these gifts I bring

such little thing

to offer
to your dying.  

*

We used to be at the hospital from morning to night. When others came I would leave so that he wouldn't feel crowded. Outside Nass hospital there is a large pond where many many swans and lots of different ducks hang out! When I came back he would ask me if had been talking to the swans again. And of course I had.
I only inherited his smile and his love of words. The other boys inherited his good looks and musical talent and practical ability.

I could only bring him things in words.

All that was to be seen were the things that made it into the poem...little things of little or no interest. A very buxom jogger jog by in pin skin-tight spandex singing of all things in March....The Little Drummer Boy. She didn't make it into the poem but she did kickstart the idea of the gifts.

I would bring him back whatever I saw. He would always ask and laugh at what I had to report. They were simple things but things he would never see again. These become precious just because of that. He found it difficult to breath an yet all he wished was that he could play his harmonica again and be at home setting the fire. Again simple pleasure but out of his reach.
Continue reading...
Apr 20 · 130
THE SCENT OF LAUGHTER
Donall Dempsey Apr 20
THE SCENT OF LAUGHTER
THE SCENT OF LAUGHTER

their laughter gathers them
together
forehead to forehead

as if one being
the world seen
from the one mind

their laughter
entangled
in the scent of roses

that rises now
from a past long since
gone

like a half forgotten fairy tale
the scent still present
to his remembrance

as if
that then
was still now

what are they
laughing at...?
he fails to remember

only
their nearness
the scent of roses
Continue reading...
Apr 18 · 31
RUINS
Donall Dempsey Apr 18
RUINS
RUINS

here now
even time
has died

people and place
alive
only in memory

as if a past
had never
existed

all trace
of who or
what they were

gone now
lost on the wind
that roams over stones

where dwelt
this house
and all of its people

and I by sleight of mind
a great magician
making it all happen

once again
as if it never could
fade away


*

My old home is just stone and nettles and birdsong as is my uncle's farmhouse with trees growing inside the house. The house I grew up in was just mud and air the last time I saw....you just walk through the nothing there.
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Apr 18 · 33
SPRING DON'T TAKE NO FOR AN ANSWER
Donall Dempsey Apr 18
SPRING DON'T TAKE NO FOR AN ANSWER
SPRING  DON'T TAKE NO FOR AN ANSWER

"Ok..!"  shouted Spring
"I know y'are in there..!"

Spring had the house
surrounded.

It had trees stationed
all about my abode

aiming their apple blossom
straight at me.

Already their perfume
had invaded the room.

I had turned into
THE INCREDIBLE SULK

sunk into
a blue funk

there was to be
no escape from.

Even my reflection wouldn't
look at me.

"OK..!' shouted Spring yet again
"...just look out your window....

surely you can see you
don't stand a chance!"

I couldn't help my self
I gave a panicked glance.

Platoons of daffodils
waiting to charge the house

yelling in yellow.

"Ok fella...this is your last chance
I'm going count to then...."

"Alright....alright...it's a fair cop
I'll come quietly!"

I kicked open the door
hands held above my head.

The trees had me
cornered.

The sunlight had me
blinded.

Happiness...sheer ******...happiness
grabbed me by the heart.

"Ok kid...easy now...easy!"
Spring soothed me

"Everything's gonna be ok...
...Ok?"

I sobbed on its shoulder
threw my despair away.
Continue reading...
Apr 17 · 48
FUNNY THAT!
Donall Dempsey Apr 17
FUNNY THAT!
FUNNY THAT!

he was
knocked out
by the Wagner

it had fallen from
the first floor but he had
never liked Wagner

his body fell
in the shape
of a broken *******

funny that
blood ebbed
into the snow

below his head
like a badly drawn
map of Ceylon

she had been throwing
her boyfriend's belongings
...out...out...out!

clothes
Wagner
an etc. of her anger

the Wagner
was barely
scratched

but
the phonograph
was completely kaput

there was more blood
than
damage done

the enraged young lady
went on to meet and marry
a postman who adored Cesar Frank

no one knows or cares
what happen to the chap who
owned the discarded possessions

the poor passer-by-in-time
recovered and went on to
write poetry though

he had never written poetry before
funny
that

He never tired
of telling of
his great escape when drunk

indeed
he had been
very drunk that day

didn't know
what
happened to him

it never ceased
to annoy him when
he wasn't believed


"Yeah yeah...sure sure!"
after that
he never liked music

*

The phonograph missed up by an inch otherwise he would have been dead but the Wagner record skimmed him just at the hairline so producing an inordinate amount of blood before settling on a bank of snow without even a scratch.

I had asked her how she had met her husband and she started telling me this tale and I thought she had married the guy she nearly clobbered but not a bit of it!  She had got rid of " 'orrible boyfriend"  and all his things through the window and the passerby was just collateral damage. She disliked Wagner and " 'orrible boyfriend" and the neighbour on the top floor came down to see if she was ok and that was that. Out with the old and ring on the finger for the new. She had heard him play Frank's Symphony in D minor in that long snowy month. So you could say she chucked Wagner for Frank.

The passerby boy was just unlucky is all and in time came to write a poem about it. Whenever he got drunk he would recall it all. They all knew it  happened as there were actually eyewitnesses to the event but they would pretend to not believe him which drove him mad and to another drink.

Funny. That!
Continue reading...
Apr 16 · 44
HIS PRAYER
Donall Dempsey Apr 16
HIS PRAYER
HIS PRAYER

Good Friday he'd always
take Christ down
from His cross

talk to him
as if Christ
was his little child

put Him near the fire
****** His crown of thorns
watch it burn amongst the coals

then he held
the Christ
near to him

croon lullabies
cuddle the tired body
watch over His sleep

Christ as dear to him
as his own child
dreaming upstairs

no Rosaries for him
loving Him for real
this the only prayer he knows

*

An old gent I used to look after from the auld sod. He lived his religion in his mind and loved Christ as if he had met him in the world of today...somebody to care for...to love. This is how he prayed...not one for rosaries on bended knee or church but prayer in his actions and how he treated people in his own life. "Be a Christ!" he would always say..."Do the things a Christ would!"
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Apr 16 · 39
CREATING THE WORLD
Donall Dempsey Apr 16
CREATING THE WORLD
CREATING THE WORLD

the sky was walking
around the world
the land trying to keep up

the weather can not
make its up its mind
what to be

"Whatever!"
the weather
thinks to itself

the sky was keeping
its clouds in order
whilst managing a sunset

the land was out of breath
becoming only a shadow
of its former self

the sky and the land
now the same dark
until the moon is turned on


*

Waking with my little one she suddenly came out with the fact that 'the sky was walking around the world' and so the rest of the words made themselves up on the spot. A poet should always carry his three year old for inspiration....she always seeing the world in her own image. Tilly creating the world.
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Apr 15 · 170
I WISH YOU WERE OLD AND WEATHERED
Donall Dempsey Apr 15
I WISH YOU WERE OLD AND WEATHERED
I WISH YOU WERE OLD AND WEATHERED

I wish that
you were old
and weathered

that wrinkles
irrigated
your face

that your hair
was a halo of white
that your bones ached

that you complained
with coughs and curses
about your great old age

rather than
Death held you
young & forever

locked
in the center
of his ageless eye

*

This is my sister Junie...the most gentle of souls...she'd stroll into your mind as if she was lifting a latch and walking right in. A fairytale in herself.
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