We are at the
sea-side burial site of someone close to the poet, Paula Meehan,
recent holder of the Chair of Irish Poetry. Ashes were thrown into
the sea at this beach and now Meehan wonders where the remains will
come ashore.
So
I think on where her mortal remains
might
reach landfall in their transmuted forms,
The poem reeks of
regret, pungent as iodine-loaded bladderwrack.
She
who died by her own hand cannot know
the
simple love I have for what she left
behind.
I could not save her. I could not
even
try.
What
is this simple love? What did she leave behind? Herself, the poet,
the one who scattered the ashes, cold as regrets?
Yet
the craft of life remains afloat, windblown, taking the poet on.
…..........
the stress of warp against weft
lifts
the stalling craft, pushes it on out.
Can
we depend on warp and weft? As time passes, can solace be found?
The
tide comes in; the tide goes out again
Is
there a yarn that knits us together following loss, whereby regret
can be woven into a blanket of peace? For Meehan, such solace is not
a blanket but a slack
sail, bound
to billow and bulge, tense and ease as days and life go by to the
ticking of the
inexorable clock.
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