Darkened Irish church

And my love for its uncontrollable self grew into veneration at Ballyconnell as we watched each wave strike at black rock.

The moment being great commotion even while the sun shone like biblical etching. We sat without words as your car rocked a mad lullaby.

Later you'd build a turf fire and the scent of it beckoned earth so fully inside the room, so fully that all my thoughts flew to Bricklieve.

And in my mind's eye I travelled with velocity and turbulence, I travelled with the north wind. Because it's where I gather strength.

It's where I exist in full fathom, even when I'm shaken and shaking.

Priest What becomes of you when you lose this grip on life?

Am I to rise up and over rooftops and become misty-breathed?

Will the sky hold my weight across its shoulders?

And what will become of my thoughts when I look down, as if a hawk over garden or meadow?

What ploughed fields will take my fancy?

What walker will have his best foot forward? Will my eyes be my very own now, across the failing light?

And if I were to rise, would I feel more or less sure of a destination?

Is there will? Or insistence, even? Is there a need to return and wake in my shadow?

Thinner and thinner I'll become, I am sure of it

Until the sigh of the day is heard, each shadow merging to alter angelic breath.

A wing beat becoming the pulse of lost thoughts letting go.

Killarney Inside this darkened church there are whispers, flame-lit candles stand like priest-smooth souls.

There are unknown angels bowing their heads, a clutter of saints who cross themselves in stony silence.

Time and time again, Christ's palms do not heal.

A blessing of rain The rain came like a blessing making the world a softer vision, and if I had the opportunity to control such things I would include rainfall at certain parts of every day — midafternoon especially, when the light is cool-grey and ancient. And always in darkness, to allow for roof sonatas. So that we may sleep inside a dreamscape of possibility.