( A Dream Song for Thomas MacGreevy )
He was homesick for the white horse
on O’Connell Bridge,
the river flowing from watered hills,
the gulls that screeched in boisterous language
above the monuments to sedition; homesick for
the midnight streets of Dublin shiny in the rain,
Valhalla on the Liffey,
his city of conspiracy that reeked of history
and night-rain hissing at the windows
of National Library, Capuchin Friary.
He was homesick for the city of the unwritten
sentence, the iambics of distress.
The city always waiting for great events –
city of disappointments,
nagging doubts, homespun sentiment;
the stale voluptuousness
of Sundays spent in the museum
where the attendant in his corner
watched in case he rubbed against
the master strokes on an ancient canvass.
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