So awkward, so mulish were they
they'd fight over their own toe nails. Over
the rinds of clippings and bacon drippings.
Going over and over with the long hold.
Nothing was as good to them as a bad fight.
The hotter and colder the better.
So long as it was long and so long as it
never veered into anything indefinite.
The rules were simple. Opposite
to opposite. Never change position.
Keep going. Keep solid. Never tire.
Going over and over with the long hold.
When they almost forgot and forgot
what it was they started, it was no matter.
When their shoulders froze and their head
set in stone, it was no matter.
When the moths fluttered in their best suit
it was no matter. When the cask was closed
it was no matter. When the ghosts laughed here
after. It was over and over with their long hold.
As told by Mary Reidy.
The story of the grandfather she'd never met.
The story she was told by her own mother.
She was only six weeks when her father died.
Her father died at forty years.
He got a pain one night, she said, and they sent for the priest.
I think it was a neighbouring man that went for the priest.
And he went for the priest anyway, and the priest came.
And as he was passing the Kilballyowen graveyard
he'd see all the men inside in the graveyard hurling ball.
And the man who went for the priest, he could hear them
saying: Kick the ball Martin Loinsigh. Kick the ball.
Kick the ball Martin Loinsigh. Kick the ball.
And when the neighbouring man went home and told her.
Her father was dead.
Eighteen years after the barbed wire was
cut down and the spiral curtain erased
the red deer from the East stayed in the East
and
the red deer from the West stayed in the West.
Not even a single nostril hair, an antler tip or
inquisitive tongue, not even a wayward fawn
strayed to the other side. Not once. Not ever.
The side that was no longer the other's side.
In the new born snow, nothing visible remained
of this harsh boundary. But their iron memory
keeps the map afraid.
they'd fight over their own toe nails. Over
the rinds of clippings and bacon drippings.
Going over and over with the long hold.
Nothing was as good to them as a bad fight.
The hotter and colder the better.
So long as it was long and so long as it
never veered into anything indefinite.
The rules were simple. Opposite
to opposite. Never change position.
Keep going. Keep solid. Never tire.
Going over and over with the long hold.
When they almost forgot and forgot
what it was they started, it was no matter.
When their shoulders froze and their head
set in stone, it was no matter.
When the moths fluttered in their best suit
it was no matter. When the cask was closed
it was no matter. When the ghosts laughed here
after. It was over and over with their long hold.
As told by Mary Reidy.
The story of the grandfather she'd never met.
The story she was told by her own mother.
She was only six weeks when her father died.
Her father died at forty years.
He got a pain one night, she said, and they sent for the priest.
I think it was a neighbouring man that went for the priest.
And he went for the priest anyway, and the priest came.
And as he was passing the Kilballyowen graveyard
he'd see all the men inside in the graveyard hurling ball.
And the man who went for the priest, he could hear them
saying: Kick the ball Martin Loinsigh. Kick the ball.
Kick the ball Martin Loinsigh. Kick the ball.
And when the neighbouring man went home and told her.
Her father was dead.
Eighteen years after the barbed wire was
cut down and the spiral curtain erased
the red deer from the East stayed in the East
and
the red deer from the West stayed in the West.
Not even a single nostril hair, an antler tip or
inquisitive tongue, not even a wayward fawn
strayed to the other side. Not once. Not ever.
The side that was no longer the other's side.
In the new born snow, nothing visible remained
of this harsh boundary. But their iron memory
keeps the map afraid.