Having one of my insomniac attacks here, so to while away the very small
hours, I'd thought I'd post my very first ever published poem. I'm still
quite fond of it, though dissatisfied with parts, I won't say which, but I'd
welcome comments.
Best
Dave
The Great Famine
I
Dust-powdered, like coals, dumped from the shoulder
in hairy sacks. To a child's eyes, tobacco-shaded,
awkward misshapes, asteroids. Damp in the hand
like dull prolonged November and the curling swathes
of North Atlantic rains. On my first maps
I traced the weather-tracks, the Gulf Stream's
warm nutritious broth, the pugnacious westward nose
on the bearded estuarine face of Ireland.
II
Tubers, of sucking, at the wet tranche of the lazybed,
nestled by the turf-cabin, iron-deficient
sun-occluded whites. Flat vowel that dulled
the wedding chorus lilt. Of the Grand Fleet's
wind-tricked wreck, survivor, first supplanter
of the little corn and the cattle set. Of Hell
or Connaught, the root. Bulbous, deformed
cell, brown consuming strain spreading
over the green land, eating, as it was eaten,
the host that it sustained. That, blighted, shaped
an empty swollen belly, a burst bag of grain.
III
Beer, we forbad them, that the barley prospered,
so they turned to porter. Land, we refused them,
for the sovereign's circulation, so they crossed
the strangers' seas. I loved the warm gobbets
of their brogue, I feared the sharp brands
of their women's scalding tongues. Like ours,
their diet, of starch and boiled cabbage parts
and a little meat and the Friday fish. On my first maps
I touched the bony chords of the Andes, dreaming
purple, yellow, pink, of shades that shrieked
macaw, of wild untasted undiscovered green.
David Bircumshaw
Leicester, England
Home Page
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