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From: "Jean R." <>
Subject: "White Hawthorn In the West of Ireland" -- Ms. Eavan BOLAND (b. Dublin 1944)
Date: Fri, 7 Oct 2005 09:41:59 -0700

WHITE HAWTHORN IN THE WEST OF IRELAND

I drove west
in the season between seasons.
I left behind suburban gardens.
Lawmowers. Small talk.

Under low skies, past splashes of coltsfoot
I assumed
the hard shyness of Atlantic light
and the superstitious aura of hawthorn.

All I wanted then was to fill my arms with
sharp flowers,
to seem, from a distance, to be part of
that ivory, downhill rush. But I knew,

I had always known
the custom was
not to touch hawthorn.
Not to bring it indoors for the sake of

the luck
such constraint would forfeit --
a child might die, perhaps, or an unexplained
fever speckle heifers. So I left it

stirring on those hills
with a fluency
only water has. And, like water, able
to redefine land. And free to seem to be --

for anglers,
and for travelers astray in
the unmarked lights of a May dusk --
the only language spoken in those parts.

-- Eavan BOLAND, "Outside History, selected poems - 1980-1990, " (Norton/1990).

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• "White Hawthorn In the West of Ireland" -- Ms. Eavan BOLAND (b. Dublin 1944) by "Jean R." <>