extract from Poem of a mole catcher’s daughter

                  If I         stand   here
                                 hearing          only
 
                  the         wind
                                                blown   in
                      on the
                                back
                      of the
                                green
                                               Irish Sea.
 
                  If I
                                close my     eyes
                      hold my         breath
                                count to             ten
 
                  will I see Granda’ Fitz’s
                                brother,     Joe?
 
                  Hear him
                                making up         poems
                                              as he      strode
                                              along     the     lane
                                                              to        St Bees?
 
An old top hat
he’d found
in the hedgerow
pushed back
on his forehead
a whistle
in his hand
his eyes mad
as a blackbird’s
caught in the rain.
 
His hands fluttering
like birds
his hair listening
to the wind
his mouth
opening and closing
like a baby bird’s.
 
His worms are words
his caterpillars are
rhymes and starlings
his poems a way
of letting jackdaws
in his head
out for a while
 
before they
lock him up again
in the workhouse.
 

Geraldine Green

published in collection, The Other Side of the Bridge, 2012, Indigo Dreams,
ISBN 978-1-9074018-6-2