Poems by Jimmy O’Connell
First Love: The Girl Next Door
We were married when we were
nine years old. Her brother wore
around his shoulder a red
and white gingham tablecloth
and prayed from his Child’s Sunday
Missal; a wad of white bread,
and a teacup for a chalice.
We held hands, but when it came to,
‘and now you may kiss the bride’,
we blushed and did not kiss.
I met her on Grafton Street
many years later, we hadn’t seen
each other since we were children.
We shook hands but did not kiss.
Maybe first instincts are desired
premonitions, after all; maybe
he should have become a priest
instead of a banker in Frankfurt;
and maybe we should have kissed
in that summer June garden.
Bewley’s Café and Bakery
The green double-decker towered over us
At the bus stop, choking traffic behind it,
As we walked up Grafton Street. I, an
Eight-year-old, brought into town to shop
With my mother and grandma, with no
Memory of the day only the moment I
Stood at Bewley’s window and watched
The coffee beans being ground in a stainless
Steel cylinder, and still can smell the aroma
As I did that first time. But that original
Moment was a register of something beyond
That morning and a treat of coffee and a chocolate
Éclair from the bakery, it has become a
Talisman of the inevitability of the realisation
That it is a lived moment where sight and smell
Form that memory, when what is lost can never
Be retrieved except in a memory which could not
Exist without that random moment of having
Stopped by Bewley’s window on that Grafton
Street morning, and at that Grafton Street moment.
The Road Behind Me
The road behind me
Has cats that ignored me,
Dogs that approached me to be petted,
Horses that nodded at me as they stood by the gate,
Cows that cared not whether I was alive or dead.
The road behind me
Had trees that waved at me,
Honeysuckle that perfumed my walk,
Hedges where families of wrens flitted,
Oak trees that gave me shelter.
The road behind me
Had herons that stood sentinel guarding the canal pathways,
Swallows that danced their jigs and reels in continuous loops,
Black birds that sang into the setting sun,
Robins that came to visit on winter mornings.
The road behind me
Had houses I grew up in with a family that cared for me,
Friends that accompanied and challenged me,
People I worked with and those I worked for,
Companions on the road I never expected to meet.
The road behind me
From whence I journeyed is mine but not mine alone;
The road behind me
Will never be relived again in the way I lived it;
But I hope the road ahead of me
Will continue to nurture me in the same spirit as my past.
Jimmy O’Connell is a member of Inklings Writing Group, who meet on Tuesdays at 11am and on Wednesdays at 7.30pm in the Annebrook House Hotel, Mullingar. Lovers of writing welcome.