(updated) Attical

A lovely welcome from my two hosts. The place is entirely run by voluteers so it's even more of an honour that I stay here for free. Everywhere I've stayed or will be stating (bar Newcastle) has supported me by giving me gratis accommodation. The taxi driver told me they are planning to give the Mournes National Park status. It already has a preservation order on it.

After tea and malt bread they give me the run of the whole place and I settle outside in the sun and the green to watch the sunshine and the tractors

last rush of summer sun
'fore autumn's blast
i sit beneath the world
where tractors pass

this is slow down town
i (try to) spoon my soup dead slow
the hills roll dead slowly back
where rivers slowly flow

At this point, with all the stress and the traveling and the rush to gather information, I felt incredibly weepy. I knew I'd overdone it.

I cleared up - washed up and napped up to wake an hour later not knowing where I was, what day it was or who I was. My hosts were coming over later to see how I was.

introduction

some call it gorse (or whin)
the sense of it from years ago
was coconut

but now that's gone
before i came

poem

for two weeks near enough
i've asked this land
the questions that has always
irked its soul

so tell me of your troubles then
what ails you?
how have the visions since 98?

the answers came straight enough
like syrup from a jar

and now in attical
i walk into a peace
that's loud enough
to shatter bullish bones

i fall asleep
the barred to any other
than my dreams

and on my waking up
that could have been
like any other opening
of the eyes -
i have no reference point

where i am
when i am
and why

and christ it hurt

blackberry picking in the mournes

along the road
the filled out blackberries
are ready with their blood
i will not break their skin
it is a promise that
at least my fingers make

i'll take instead their kindness
to the tongue
fell the shapes
of building blocks
that make the up

each taste is different
one tart
one sour as pus
open bland
one perfect holy sweet

i pick at each
until a mile or so
of coming to the fence

(o ireland
- i thought barbed wire
was over now for you)

the gate seems fixed

but one leg
two leg
(my boot gets tethered by a hook -
i laugh and tug it off)

i'm over now

it seems i could remember this
last visit scrambling

this time - i see the cold rocks
as brothers now to heave me up

sheep pose for me
stand still

the grass is wet and clinging to my tread
i carry on - until a levelness
where i can breathe it in

- sheep shit
- salt water far ahead
- the mountains of mourne

so bury me
(don't wait for me to die)
not in one place
where other dead can gawp

split my soul in two

one half in cushendall
the other side will lie below
the green-ness where i stand

i will be in bliss

so let the roots of gorse
come lay their roots on me

i repeat

just let the roots of gorse
come lay their roots on me

sunday walking

My host takes me for a drive out and an explanation of some Irish grammar. We discuss my next idea which is to set up an exchange between Irish language groups in England and similar classes in Ireland. She takes me to Spelga Dam. There is absolute peace here - too much peace in fact. There is no bird life whatsoever. The only drama is when a ripple occurs. I feel a poem coming on...

poem one

watching the sheen - there is no bird life - yet
each ripples enough to make action a flight
the gaps seem like lost consonants (short waves)
there was a drowning here - now just me with my photograph

she takes me with the dam - just catching light
the wooden shack's dilapidated (stock
still) perched as i am by the crisp black edge
the focus of this photograph will be my jacket's red

glow and the starkness of this place
she drops me further back to battle with the mournes
drawn towards the mist - it takes me long enough
i love the mountain's kiss upon my face

it has been photographed - though slieve muck
pushed me back before i passed

poem two

i focus up and ever up
these mountains seem to have no spire
but ever rolling waves of carry on

and up and ever up

each rock looks like
some lazy piece of brie
just lying there

and up and ever up

i stop to see the
altered angle of the slope
i am captivated

i race the mist
that falls the other way

i am ever up

sheep with blood red backs
stop move on
move on then stop
make steps

and up
and up

the ridge fills
blind with cappuccino froth
its hand has spread its fatness
round slieve muck's neck

i'm up
and up
and ever up

before my shoes
were wet with boggy grass

now they traverse
the almost vertical
where air collides with air
and more the same

and when i'm slipping
clasping
drivign on
the stuff is green

but when i'm looking back

the mountain's skin
is brown

not muddy stuff
just brown

how things that change
when traveling on the up