City of Shadows

From "Colony"

When I saw my father

buttoning this coat at Front Gate

I thought he would look like a man

who had lost what he had. And he did:

Grafton Street and Nassau Street were gone.

And the old parliament at College Green.

And the bronze arms and attitudes of orators

from Grattan to O’Connell. All gone.

We went to his car. He got in.

I waved my hands and motioned him to turn

his wheel towards the roads to the only

straight route out to the coast.

When he did

I walked beside the car,

beside the kerb, and we made our way

in dark inches to the Irish Sea.

Then I smelled salt

and heard the foghorn.

And realized suddenly that I

had brought my father to his destination.

I walked home

alone to my flat

The fog was lifting slowly. I thought

whatever the dawn made clear

and cast-iron and adamant again,

I would know from now on that in

a lost land of orators and pedestals

and corners and street names and rivers,

where even the ground underfoot

was hidden from view, there had been

one way out.

And I found it.

---(c) Eavan Boland. All rights reserved.