(Insert Original Title Here)

For M

Pooka paces to and fro as furious

finger lift and tug an ebony mane,

tossing the crackling ruby eyes that

warm two small shivering bodies

a hill and a moor towards town.

Deirfiur mhor, deirfiur og.

They no longer fight for the honour

of serving the whiskey;

graduated to higher circles with

uncles, neighbours, cousins

the dancing goes on, wild faerie revels of reels

strains of longing in the night.

The flame bites her back but

she doesn’t drop her fiddle, no, nor flush

with her sister’s tears as

Pa says, “Martin, a leanbh, mo ghra,

my comortas champion, you make me so proud.”

Deirfiur mhor, deirfiur og.

The yellow butter fat, raspberry

jam a river of urine and blood through

hillocks of raisins, glistens the reflection

of soda bread against her tin pail.

Sister Mary Katherine tells her that she dances

too much, that prayer calluses

replace fiddle scores-

She tears the hills apart as

her sister leaves for Cill Airne.

Deirfiur mhor, deirfiur og.

Yet, ‘tis now that tears trace

rending rivulets from crows- feet eyes

to pebbles teeth, as wrinkles whittled

by memory map

the way to Ben Bulben.

Her calluses have deepened

harsh lines of carved, sculpted

years of bowing her sister’s fiddle-

a claddagh ring trapped forever

in swollen whorls.

Mo chuisle mo chroi

Her whorls are sketched upon my

knuckles, slowly bulging

with the wail of the bean sidhe

through our reel.