Frances Wilde
Outskirts
Fixed myself
in an unassertive stance
in the Central Library Bar,
Perched precariously
on the peripheries of
conversations.
Opposite a couple,
talking in shades of
hilarity and comradery,
about their trip to England,
football, beer, Liver birds.
How peculiar Liverpool sounds
with Dublin vowels.
Dame Street to Hope Street –
GPO’s aggressive seagulls
to bombed-out-Cathedral.
One small sea apart,
Home and home.
Each catching a glance with
the other in acknowledgement.
My dialect shaking hands with both.
Our Foot’s in the Door
That Guardian article read
time, space, money,
money for time and space.
Men love to talk
barriers and quotas,
Putting a percentage on
poverty.
Drinking filter coffee
and tapping the face
of a gold-plated watch.
Watching us squirm.
Our knuckles are
squashed mightily
in the door hinge.
Bruised and burnt-out
but unmoving.
We’re at the threshold
Linked battered arms
Holding leaky pens.
Swim to Inis Leacan
I see myself
in the Gurteen Bay
shallow cove,
reflected back
a wobbly silver-blue.
Sombre clouds shrouding
a clear silhouette,
ocean washing in,
to tell me (in coercive tones)
who I am.
Memories rising
from the water
to greet me.
Who were we,
swimming for miles,
at slack water?
Arctic terns,
screeching cheerily above,
exude the end of a season.
Tide turns.