Hy-Brasil

High Tide and low expectations

He walked out from his cottage

It was November and raining softly

The wind was fuck cold against his face

In the distance he saw the wreck of

The Basking whaler

And the ruins of the rendering plant 

Whispering through the drizzle

Now he was an old man

Older at least than his father

When he succumbed to the soil  

Older than the ocean

That beat against his heart

The stench still lingered on the beach

The sweet smell of death

Of sharks and farmers

Why did they stay?

Stay on this cracked island?

A place of ghosts

He waded out to his waist

A man watched him from the shore

The sea was calm and, on the horizon

An island came into view

He’d seen it once before

When he was just a child

The old ones told tales of this place

Superstitious fools

Chained to the church and folklore

His father was never one of them

He could still speak the tongue

Of his father’s fathers

And worked the land

Cut the peat and placed

It on that ancient hearth

He had now inherited

Oh! what a prize

Only son

Only living heir

He had to return home

From Camden Town 

From the lie of London

And his half life

Of cruising the clubs

As the freezing waves

Washed over his thin frame

He remembered his own faith

Ah, there was a boy once

Up in Belmullet

The day they spent on Glosh beach

And walking to Doohoma Head

Hidden from sin

But that was a universe ago

A few years back

Filled with weed and self-pity

He’d searched his name on Facebook

Saw him sat happily with his wife

And three smiling kids

We all have to live our own miseries  

Good luck to him

Crawl up Croagh Patrick

On yer bleeding knees

The man shouted out to him

A language he didn’t understand

And yet resonated deep

Somewhere inside his blood

He began to swim

The island seemed so near

Shimmering like a sunlit atoll

They called it ‘Hy-Brasil’

And just as he reached it

It disappeared 

He returned to the shore

The man had disappeared too

The rain had stopped

And the sun briefly came out

A rainbow appeared above the hills

He shuddered as he finally

Got back to his home

He put on his dressing gown

And placed another square

Of peat on the fire

Poured himself a glass of malt

Lit a joint

He heard a voice in the flames

“Seo e ar mbaile mo mhac”