University of St. Thomas (Center for Irish Studies)

Lament for My Family, Lost at SeaAuthor(s): Thomas O'GradySource: New Hibernia Review / Iris Éireannach Nua, Vol. 4, No. 2 (Summer, 2000), pp. 41-42Published by: University of St. Thomas (Center for Irish Studies)Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20557653 .

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Fil?ocht Nua: New Poetry

MOUSETRAP

Folk Museum, Toomevara, Co. Tipperary

Build a better mousetrap, a wise man said,

and the world will heat a path to your door.

A bitter pill for that creature we found dead

last week, a fetal form on the closet floor,

batted there, we guessed (the rattle and bang

of the night before explained), by a gray

flurry of unsheathed claw and naked fang, a lap cat turned tiger at end of day.

But spill no tears for such a brute demise.

Imagine instead that quaint contraption

in Toomevara, the crudest of machines:

a baited box, bottom-hinged for?surprise!?

a scaffold drop to a water-filled tin_

Would death seem sweeter by any other means?

LAMENT FOR MY FAMILY, LOST AT SEA

So small that rain-besotted, wind-plagued place?

so shipwreck-shallow its surrounding seas.

Unmoored at last, cast off with derelict

concern, we swore to plant our masts?each sail

trimmed to a blazoned flag saluting Life!?

atop some lofty point of no return.

The thrill of risking all for a rich return?

hedging our bets, wagering that win, place

or show, we could find ourselves set for life:

how brazenly we held to that half-seas

over hope of catching fortune in full sail?

the blind-drunk dream of every derelict.

41

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Fil?ocht Nua: New Poetry

Already in our minds that derelict

coast, high and dry against the tide's return,

filled the horizon bright as a mainsail

spread before the four winds' will. Why not place

our trust in the billowing seven seas?

The way the delve and churn of island life

dragged incessantly on, long as a life

sentence, who would dare judge us derelict

for choosing transportation overseas?

Guilt-free?knowing no jury could return

a verdict just to put us in our place?

with such giddy innocence we set sail.

Or ignorance. To watch those stormclouds sail

overhead dark as Fate yet for the life

of us never think twice that we might place

ourselves in peril?O such derelict

common sense! But how we spurned the return

of native wisdom, taking to the Seas

of Faith and Doubt like stars in a high-seas

drama of our own plotting, as if sail

and spar were actors' props we might return

to backstage storage, and our plight?true life

and-death?was less real than that derelict

schooner ablaze in legends of the place.

Now how these heartless seas batter sheer life?

the salt-tattered sail of our derelict

souls. O to return to that harboring place_

42

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