IN MEMORIAM
Angela Byrne – Three poems
Angela Byrne was born in Dublin. Her training includes City and Guilds Printing, Guildford College of Technology, Surrey, UK. She was a founder member of the ‘Pauper’s Press Printing Cooperative’, Oxford, UK. In 1987 she set up ‘pirateproductions’, Design and Screen-Printing. Angela returned to Ireland in 1997 to settle in Connemara. She has worked on a number of projects locally including painting Signs and Murals; has collaborated in a number of Multi-Media projects with ‘Galway Women in Media and Entertainment’. Her Paintings and Prints have been exhibited in Connemara and Galway City in Solo and Group Exhibitions.
She was working with the Rosmuc based Artist’s collective ‘An Scuab Fraoigh’ and was a member of Visual Artists Ireland.
Distant Horizons
Follow me up the hillside
to walk on soft tufts of bog grass
jump piles of boulders strewn
left since the last ice receded
to contemplate lonely vistas
light ever-changing
depending on
time of day or season
the lakes below stretching to the Maamturk mountains
in sometimes obscured horizons
dry stone walls about here piled high
each side of the boreen
least the wind blow you away
making a refuge for many plants
common and exotic
daisy, pansy, orchid, wild garlic, foxglove,
gorse and heather
wild goats, hardy ponies, and cattle
an occasional donkey
working dogs,
the people speak an ancient language
talking being a local hobby,
whilst watching distant horizons.
Stayed too long
Stayed too long in a space that beckoned with shiny example
plucked out my eyeballs in disbelief
stole an aching heart
always a random thief
left to her own devices she shunted on edges frayed temper tamed
a splatter of rain smudge of red on a woodland canvas
were we all napping when the ecologist called that day
ran out spluttering from toxic inhalation
forgot to pack the dream catcher
left to her own devices she shunted on edges frayed temper tamed
this nostalgia
a big pile-up of years passing memories condensing
dribbling along a copper tube
yielding a crystal clear drop
a tantalising moment
a pause before a dive into a cold sea
left to her own devices she shunted on edges frayed temper tamed.
Tara
Height of summer up Tara
in between one day and another
the low cloud obscures no moon
wind like a plaintiff cry ushering in calamity
but who is there to listen, take note, act on,
my sister says, “We all live in our own bubble”.
This, a petrochemical post-scarcity Garden of Eden
ribbons and baubles bedeck the ‘fairy tree’
a lottery of wishes and hopes
looking to the west I take flight.
The Galway Review 