Other voices, radical notes,
views unorthodox and new,
now abound in modern Ireland,
clear and loud and (sometimes) true.
A latter-day Tower of Babel,
each opinion seeking weight;
clamouring, raucous and insistent,
a mighty flood of words in spate.
The Church is right, the Church is wrong,
politicians lie and cheat:
Dublin City's up the Swanee,
a stronghold of the "new elite."
The West is Ireland's pulsing heart,
a bastion of the Celtic soul--
a delusion of romantic eejits,
repudiated by the dole.
Who speaks for Ireland, who is right,
and does it matter in the end?
Obsession with identity
is a national trait we must transcend.
"I am a Jew and my name is Bloom"*
is what your man, Paul Durcan, said.
Let us all just live as one,
none of this matters when we're dead.
* Although Bloom is of course the famous character in Joyce's Ulysses, the line quoted above is from a brilliant poem by Paul Durcan called "The Bloomsday Murders, 16 June 1997."
Please tell me what you think
Comments
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i never fail to appreciate you, Bad Bill ... the disease of which you speak long ago destroyed most people's brain over here only it didn't happen with the gusto that you describe, it happened like a dog that just doesn't have any more pee in it ... and it doesn't even know it
ya know?
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Dagnabit, bro! When asked of places I've yet to visit, I spit, "Tanzania and Zimbabwe" but Ireland...? Man, the more I read your writes (and your pride) the more curious I become. Keep sharing, bro. Write on. One.
Dez
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I would have thought Dublin was up the Liffee myself, not the Swanee, but that just shows my higgerance, innit.
Fine poem, Bill
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