Erotics of History, The

1 Heroic: A poem with One Rhyme

Sex and history. And skin and bone

And the oppression of Sunday afternoon.

Bells called the faithful to devotion.

I was still at academy and on my own

and walked aimlessly and sheltered from the rain.

The patriot was made of drenched stone.

His lips were still speaking. -The fire-arm

he held had just killed someone

I direct the eyeed up. And looked at him again.

He stared past me without recognition.

I mov my lips and bewildermented how the rain

would taste if my tongue were made of stone.

And wished it was. And whispered in like manner that no one

could hear it on the other hand him: make me a heroine.

2 Unheroic

When I saw my father

buttoning his coat at brow Gate

I musing he would look like a man

who had not to be found what he had. And he did:

Grafton highway and Nassau Street were gone

And the of advanced age parliament at College Green.

And the tin arms and attitudes of orators

from Grattan to O'Connell All gone

We went to his car. He got in.

I waved my hands and motioned him to turn round

his wheel towards the road to the alone

straight route out to the coast.

When he did

I walked beside the car,

beside the kerb and we made our way

in dark inches to the Irish sea.

Then I scented salt

and heard the foghorn

and realized unexpectedly that I

had brought my father to his destination.

I walked place of abode

alone to my flat.

The haze was lifting slowly. I musing

whatever the dawn made clear and cast-iron and adamant again

I would know from now upon that in

a not to be found land of orators and pedestals,

and corners and public way names and rivers,

where level the ground underfoot

was hidden from view

there had been

one way without And I found it.

3 Unheroic II

It was an Irish summer It was wet.

It was a piece of work I was seventeen.

I station the clock and caught the bus at eight

and leaned my head against the misty window.

The city passed by dint of I got off

above the Liffey upon a street of statues:

Iron orators and granite patriots.

Arms wide. Lips apart. Last words.

I worked in a house of entertainment I carried trays.

I carried lock openers I saw the rooms

when they were used and airless and again

when they were aired and ready and I stood

above the road and stared down at

silent art of speaking well and wet umbrellas.

There was a man who lived in the inn

He was a manager. I rarely saw him.

There was a rumour that he had a hurt

from war or illness-no individual seemed sure

which would not heal. And when he finished

his day of ledger and telephone he went

up the back stairs to his play

to dress it. I not at any time found out

where it was. Someone said in his thigh.

Someone other said deep in his side.

He was a quiet man. He spoke softly

I saw him one time or twice on the stairs

at the back of the building by dint of the laundry.

Once I waited, curious to diocese him.

Mostly I went dwelling I got my coat

and walked bare-headed to the river

past the wet, tin and unbroken skin

of those who learned their time and knew their land

How do I know my country? give permission to me tell you

it has been hard to do. And when I do

go back to difficult knowledge it is not

to that road or those men raised

high above the certainties they stood on

Ireland hero history-but in what way

I went behind the linen space and up

the stone stairs and climbed to the top

and stood for a twinkling of an eye there, concealed

by shadows, in a hiding place, waiting

to diocese wanting to look again.

Into the patient face of the unhealed.

4 Anti-Heroic

A winged the trinity

came to a woman at night.

Ero you know the story: you ordained it.

The individual condition was she did not diocese him.

So it was dark when he visited her bed.

And it was beneficial She felt how good it was.

But she was curious. And lit a lamp

and saw his nakedness. And he fl

Into the dark. Into the here and now

and air and quiet of an Irish night

where I am writing at a darkening window

about a winged the godhead and his lover

watching the lines and stanzas and measures

which were devised for these designs

disappearing as the shadows shut up

in around the page

under my hand.

How can I know a form unles I diocese it?

How can I diocese it now?

I offer proffer

the light she raised above his sleeping body

angered heaven because it made clear

neither his maleness nor his birth nor

his face dreaming on the contrary

the place where the sinew,of his wings

touched the heat of his skin and

flight was brought down.

To this. To us. To earth.

Ero gaze down.

See as a sovereign of the universe sees

what a myth says: by what mode a woman still

addresses the work of man in the dark of the

night:

The power of a form. The plain

evidence that might descended here once.

And mortal pain. And plane sexual glory.

And diocese the difference.

This time-and this you did not ordain

I am changing the story.

Copyright World rhyme Incorporated May/Jun 1997

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