Sunday, October 18, 2009

Inchicore Haiku

Inchicore Haiku by Michael Hartnett


1.
Now, in Inchicore
my cigarette-smoke rises-
like lonesome pub-talk.

2.
Down in Glendarragh
noises wake an anxious house.
I hear the doors slam.

3.
Dark sits here in me
and I leave all the lights on.
But nobody calls.

4.
Rain turns creator
and the dandelions explode
into supernovae.

5.
From daffodil cups
we drink Paddy-and-ginger -
the spring hangover.

6.
No goldfinches here -
puffed sparrows in sunpatches
like Dublin urchins.

7.
Stalking Emmet Road
a shocked rook blessed me with crusts -
manna for the dead.

8.
My English dam bursts
and out stroll all my bastards.
Irish shakes its head.

9.
Somewhere in the house
a tap gushes out water -
sounds of someone else.

10
I perfume myself
with the sweat of loneliness,
bed a dead meadow.

11
On a brick chimney
I can see all West Limerick
in a jackdaw's eye.

12
Poets drink poems
in the noise of the dark day.
Night's at the window.

13
In the Richmond House
a good priest pressed in my palm
glad absolution.

14
The local bread-shop:
a fresh smell of broken homes,
a fist of wife's tears.

15
Hopeful telephones
tinkle in the empty house.
"Sorry! Wrong number."

16
In the sad canal
my face and a broken wheel -
debris of dead tribes.

17
Songs from my younger days
and high spirits in small towns -
and floats in the air.

18
I push in a plug.
Mozart comes into the room
riding a cello.

19
In local chippers
sad cod dream in fresh batter.
The Atlantic cries.

20
My father, now lost,
give me the mind of a Christ -
I drink with Pilate.

21
In the empty house
the doorbell calls "Company!"
I hide on the stairs.

22
There is no darkness
in my techicoloured soul -
like a made-up whore's.

23
Bags of onion-sets -
and a sense of lost gardens
brings tears to the heart.

24
Sparrows mate on trees.
Lawnmowers, restless in sheds,
grant one night of sleep.

25
From St Michael's Church
the electric Angelus -
another job gone.

26
My liver sneers up
from the bottom of a glass
snug in golden hell.

27
I want the country:
how trees grow out of cement.
And paper leaves fall.

28
A dead river flows
on under the live bridges.
And fishermen weep.

29
Poets visit me -
day of wine and aubergines -
the cuckoo-clock clucks.

30
The cats at civil war
in the partitioned garden.
I stroke my whiskers.

31
All the flats cry out:
"Is there life before Dole day?"
The pawnshops snigger.

32
A pint of Guinness -
black as my Catholic heart,
black as broken vows.

33
I want spring water,
a well with frozen mouth.
Here, I drink my own.

34
I watch the sky change,
the moon swallowing the stars.
Dandelions go grey.

35
Hollows in my cheeks:
death giving me its dimples.
The tap drops a tear.

36
Into withered peace,
into the conquered garden
charge green bayonets.

37
What do bishops take
when the price of bread goes up?
A vow of silence.

38
I learned the hard way
acts of love can break a heart.
Seven white seagulls.

39
I hear the lights hum
and a cigarette erupts.
Soft light strokes my head.

40
Dead faces watch me -
people I have wronged and loved.
Milk sours in the cup.

41
Oh my next haiku!
Exiled minds are unaware.
Starlings flock to stills.

42
The tap drops a tear,
the bulb thinks it's a crocus.
I am full of salt.

43
Watching all the slums
replace his tribal village -
an old Barricker.

44
I'm stopped in the street.
A stranger tells me his sins.
And he forgives me.

45
I can hear the sea
miles from the healing beaches -
in my room's seashell.

46
Sanctifying grace:
a seagull and a jackdaw.
They kiss in the sky.

47
Children wrapped in dusk,
smells of apple and ice-cream.
I cry lemonade.

48
Crouched under alders,
only half the body drenched.
The rain feels cheated.

49
Now, in Inchicore,
margarine generations
are pale in spring sun.

50
My beloved hills,
my family and my friends -
my empty pockets.

51
I hear a cockroach
wipe its feet and run across
the carpet's drumskin.

52
Banished for treason,
for betraying my country.
I live in myself.

53
I am not afraid
(I will die proud like I lived),
only petrified.

54
All round, bright lights,
windows of one well-secured.
I step on a snail.

55
Along Emmet Road
politicians' promises
blow like plastic bags.

56
My wife, my children -
the noise of spring approaching.
My three white seagulls.

57
Clouds collide above,
stars gossip incessantly.
Noise will drive me mad.

58
Daisies stand at easr,
the tulips shout "Attention!"
Lawnmowers open fire.

59
The warm dead go by
in mahogany boxes.
"They're well-housed at last."

60
A long way to go
with all my elm trees withered.
I was a canal.

61
In the Richmond House
the floorboards ooze ancient tears
of unemployment.

62
Now no one can fill
the bare desert of my bed.
Nipples like Rolos.

63
Then a morning bird
and I laugh at my poems.
Hope breaks down the door.

64
Blackbird, robin, thrush?
I cannot place the singer.
Exile blunts the ear.

65
The seed is the nut
and green leaves are brown compost.
Hope goes down the stairs.

66
Things are still alive:
a mouse, a sprouting onion -
things I will not kill.

67
In local chippers,
queueing for carbohydrates -
a dwarfed people.

68
Women in the street
all sleek suburban housewives.
I turn away my eyes.

69
"Shame," says the Camac
dying in its unwashed bed.
Dustbins bathe in it.

70
Women in the street
faces the colour of fear.
I turn away my eyes.

71
I make my sad verse
but hope keeps interfering -
forget-me-nots wink.

72
In a green spring field
a brown pony stands asleep
shod with daffodils.

73
In St Michael's Church
a plush bishop in his frock
confirms poverty.

74
I dream of acres -
a prairie of a women.
A thigh is a vice.

75
Spiders lament as
the last moth in Dublin dies.
Cars are exhausted.

76
Where houses once stood -
thistledown there as white as
politicians' smiles.

77
The twin spires escapes,
the cropped lime trees try to fly:
car-fumes stay mouth high.

78
On Tyrconnell Road
Catholic Emancipation -
thirteen milk-bottles.

79
She sat like a finch
in the hollow of my hand.
But I let he free.

80
I drink my regrets
mixed with a dash of bitters.
My lungs smoke cancer.

81
Books and poems flood
my room in a white deluge,
my pen hides from me.

82
Dying in exile.
To die without a people
is the real death.

83
Tell the people "yes"
and the state will grant you
a crucifixion.

84
To give all I am.
A rejection is worse than
the worst of loneliness.

85
The empty pockets
old bills pounding on the door.
Are these my people?

86
All divided up,
all taught to hate each other.
Are these my people?

87
My dead father shouts
from his eternal Labour:
"These are your people!"