Grianghraf nach bhfaca mé cheana, mé féin agus triúr deartháireacha liom.
Col ceathrair liom a thug an grianghraf dom. 'Cén fáth sa diabhal a bhfuil bata im ghlac?' arsa mise leis. 'Ó,' arsa mo chol ceathrair, 'bhíodh bata agat an uair úd.' Agus chuimhníos siar ansin agus sea, bhí an ceart aige. Bhíodh bata agam an uair úd. Bhíos chun an domhan ar fad a threascairt. Féara arda is mó a bhuaileas. Bhuailinn scáileanna, leis, naimhde nárbh ann dóibh, púcaí. Ar bhuaileas éinne de mo dheartháireacha? Is dócha gur bhuail, go maithe Dia dhom é. Ba é Michael an té ba shine. Bádh é i nGleann Dá Loch. Scríobhas marbhna dó. Níor fhoilsíos riamh é. Is i mBéarla a scríobhas é. Ní fhéadfainn é a scríobh i nGaeilge mar is ag caint leis féin a bhíos sa dán. Focal Gaeilge níor labhras riamh leis: |
To a Brother Drowned
Cold the waters of Glendalough in June
divers searching for your body
luckless cormorants
You give them no clue
waiting in silence
your eyes do not see the dawn
In the Glen of Two Lakes where Kevin prayed
you now perform unwilling austerities
night after wave-cursed night
What fishes gape
as your body turns sour
and changes hue
What last poems pound in your brain
bubbling up to the astonished air!
It may well have been that blackbirds sang that day
clouds scudded
linnets dashed for cover
on secret missions
a ladybird emerged from lungwort
We witnessed nothing
something in us forgot to surface
lingering dumbly
in umbrous, uncharted zones
(We were not of the O’Byrnes or the O’Donoghues
whom the banshee might have wailed…)
Decked out in your coffin
in the robes of the Children of Mary
an illustration from some exotic book –
a sacrifice to an unpronounceable god
who had long lost touch with his people.
