Recollections of an Irish Childhood 3

Thoughts from the woods in rural Ireland (Summer 1964)

There is a green glade where ponies graze
Where late evening sun lies down the bluebells
There is a pool only some of us knew
A dark, dark pool where I used to gaze

Down, down to its muddied edge
and stop and stoop
On well-worn stone

And scoop deep, deep waters
And watch squint-eyed as spiders skim across its mirrored face
And just beside this quiet water child,

Mother River, bosom-brown sits
Her silent flow broken only
By the flip, flop, drop of hungry trout
Casting an eye for the dead-lazy fly.

A startled blackbird screams
Through the undergrowth
And I awake.