The Piper’s Call
(Planxty: Dublin 2005)
The high note, held, stretching
the space above the drone;
like wind torn spray
as the great wave, darkening, builds;
wailing like the curve of the bay,
lean as famine, leaning into
the blurred percussion
of Atlantic rollers, coming home
across unfathomable depth,
to crash onto the present
this cargo of raw, wounded memory.
Like a window blasted open,
the music admits the smell of rain
drumming on the shuttered house.
Where the locals never learn to spell
the migrant’s name, the dancers stamp and call,
while by the fire, whiskey and stories
blur in customary gestures.
Laughter and exuberance, suspended
without resolution, above
a strained and ruined loneliness.
Written after listening to Liam O'Flynn playing solo at Planxty's concert in Dublin in 2005.
This poem originally published in Rough Spun to close Weave.
Details can be found at WWW.liamguilar.com
