IRISH-AMERICAN-L Archives

From: "Jean R." <>
Subject: [IRISH-AMER] "Whinlands" - Derry's Seamus HEANEY (contemp.)
Date: Tue, 16 Dec 2008 21:21:13 -0800

WHINLANDS

All year round the whin
Can show a blossom or two
But it's in full bloom now.
As if the small yolk stain
>From all the birds' eggs in
All the nests of spring
Were spiked and hung
Everywhere on bushes to ripen.

Hills oxidize gold.
Above the smoulder of green shoot
And dross of dead thorns underfoot
The blossoms scald.

Put a match under
Whins, they go up of a sudden.
They make no flame in the sun
But a fierce heat tremor

Yet incineration like that
Only takes the thorn--
The tough sticks don't burn,
Remain like bone, charred horn.

Gilt, jaggy, springy, frilled,
This stunted, dry richness
Persists on hills, near stone ditches,
Over flint bed and battlefield.

-- Seamus HEANEY

Seamus Heaney, who writes incomparably about the mossy places of Ulster,
grew up on the edge of the Sperrins. And it's true that in a mild winter the
whin, or gorse, is in perpetual flower. The blossoms smell like sweet
coconut. Boiling eggs in whin to dye them yellow is an Easter custom. Some
farmers pound the prickles to feed to their horses - it's said to keep the
coat glossy. Pigs like whin too. A good root in a whin bush is a pig's
delight.

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• [IRISH-AMER] "Whinlands" - Derry's Seamus HEANEY (contemp.) by "Jean R." <>