25 of August 2012
The Summer seemed to wane and falter in Ireland, lush land of mists, of sun through showers, luxuriante, foisonnante vegetation. Soft rain and gentle light. Listening to sea-chanties on the radio as the Tall Ships came in, we arrived, by Glenbeigh and Kells, and Little Saidhbh’s Stone Fort, to the Iveragh Penninsula. Real memories and false ones, imagined ones, jostled. The patch of sun and blue sky amid the heavy, thunderous, bruise-purple clouds that huddled in herds around the barren hill-tops indeed like a “small gap into Heaven”. Turf-fire and “leafy lanes of Autumn flowers” ; the four colours: yellow gorse, orange montbretia, blue and deep-pink fuchsia, purple … what? Digitalis? The cottage, backed by “stream-crossed, stone-crossed fields” on down to the bay, An Choráin, The Whirlpool. Inber Scéine. And across the way, the fine new-old summer-houses, aptly-named: Líos Lír. This is indeed his place, where the “sky, the earth, the ocean meet”. My “Ballinskelligs Sonnet” now on the wall, “Three Worlds”.
Three Worlds
A Sonnet at Ballinskelligs
The sea, earth, sky are soft together,
The clouds rush in upon the shore,
The waves across the sea; beneath her
Green-brown waves, earth’s yellow gorse.
The road from Glenbeigh’s solemn wonder,
First sight of sea pulls deep your breath in,
A patch of blue and sun and thunder,
Like a small gap into heaven.
The mist sings softly from the hills,
The sky, the earth, the ocean meet,
The salt, soft air we drink our fill,
A rock upon the shore our seat,
The wave’s soft roaring rushes in,
The peace without blossoms within.
– “Three World – A Vision”‘, Malachas Ivernus, The Adorations, 2019
We met the boat in a misty, drizzly morning, in which curtains of rain swept down off Bolus Head to meet us. I knew it was a special time. Five years ago, first with her, Christmas, birthdays, horror, pain, laughter, merry-making. Twenty years a-going. And a place for Pilgrimage. Imramma.
The little boat headed out, past Horse Head Island, the Ruined Abbey, the Castle, between the rocks from Baile an Sceilg pier. We sat at the back, saw the headland floating past on our right, the Famine Village at Kil Réilig. We headed out, and fine mist and spray swished in our delighted, soon-salt-stained faces, sitting on the bench at the back of the boat.
The waves began to smack, the boat to buck beneath us as we breasted each crest, as we plunged each trough; cut across the swell. With a dash, and a lunge, we’d cut a rise, and the swash leap over and catch us in the face. Wet, wetter, soaked. The Sloe-Eyed Girl moved forward, I remained. I embraced, licked salt water from my lips, smoothed it from my hair, I laughed aloud in praise and thanks. My Sea-Stones in my pocket, my Crane Bag on my lap (still salt-stained now). The rear and plunge came deeper, sheerer. I said,
“Mannanán Mac Lír, this one’s for you”
I held on tighter. Couldn’t move now if I wanted, for fear of going over. One hand tight on the side, one hand holding slats of benches, as if crucified there, Hanged, Drowned Man, I tried not to stiffen, to move with the waves. I sang the “Seacht Páidreacha”, I sang “Transna na Donnta”, and “Báidín Fhéilime”.
I said, “this one’s for you,” and you could feel him say, “Oh Really?”
We reached that Holy Place, surely long-hallowed when Patrick walked, and climbed the thousand steps to the Oratory. There we sat, and looked beyond, to the Horizon. There we supped of the Peace that Passeth Understanding.
And on the Way Back Home, in the Last Light, I saw his White Horses, Caipple Manannáin, tossing manes in our Wild White Wake ….
For I am now Maol Manannain, and my head shorn for You. Lord of the Sidhe, King of the Mounds, Keeper of the Isle of Apples, Weaver of Mists; your Fog of Forgetting, your Cloak of Protection, your Sword of Answers to all Questions. Your Crane Bag plumbs the Depths, your Life Depends.
Mark Devlin
Mythopoetic Cultural Anthropologist Bard
Tour Guide, Translator, Father of Two
