Unheroic

From "Colony"

It was an Irish summer. It was wet.

It was a job. I was seventeen.

I set the clock and caught the bus at eight

and leaned my head against the misty window.

The city passed by. I got off

above the Liffey on a street of statues:

iron orators and granite patriots.

Arms wide. Lips apart. Last words.

I worked in a hotel. I carried trays.

I carried keys. I saw the rooms

when they were used and airless and again

when they were aired and ready and I stood

above the road and stared down at

silent eloquence and wet umbrellas.

There was a man who lived in the hotel.

He was a manager. I rarely saw him.

There was a rumor that he had a wound

from war or illness—no one seemed sure—

which would not heal. And when he finished

his day of ledgers and telephones he went

up the back stairs to his room

to dress it. I never found out

where it was. Someone said in his thigh

Someone else said deep in his side.

He was a quiet man. He spoke softly.

I saw him once or twice on the stairs

at the back of the building by the laundry.

Once I waited, curious to see him.

Mostly I went home. I got my coat

and walked bare-headed to the river

past the wet, bronze and unbroken skin

of those who learned their time and knew their country.

How do I know my country? Let me tell you

it has been hard to do. And when I do

go back to difficult knowledge, it is not

to that street or those men raised

high above the certainties they stood on—

Ireland hero history—but how

I went behind the linen room and up

the stone stairs and climbed to the top.

And stood for a moment there, concealed

by shadows. In a hiding place.

Waiting to see.

Wanting to look again.

Into the patient face of the unhealed.

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