{"id":14148,"date":"2022-08-29T12:17:37","date_gmt":"2022-08-29T11:17:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cassandravoices.com\/?p=14148"},"modified":"2022-08-29T12:17:37","modified_gmt":"2022-08-29T11:17:37","slug":"poetry-peter-oneill-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/2022\/08\/29\/poetry-peter-oneill-3\/","title":{"rendered":"Poetry: Peter O’Neill"},"content":{"rendered":"

Irish Rail <\/strong><\/p>\n

Dublin, that old whore, with her piss -stained pavements
\nAbruptly transforms into a woman of a certain station.
\nSuch are the, at once, brutal and subtle shifts where
\nIn an instant, Hell aligns in an altogether strict<\/p>\n

Congruence\u2026 Like when you climb aboard
\nThe final commuter train of the week on a Friday
\nEvening on Platform One at Pearse Station.
\nAnd, as the train finally pulls out, leaving<\/p>\n

Behind her the contents of a working week,
\nPassing images are reflected back to you
\nThrough the compartment windows, revealing<\/p>\n

Dune and marram at Portmarnock, to a passing
\nLagoon at Malahide, and then the panoply of imagery
\nMiraculously washes away all of the whoredom from your mind.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The Great Burnishment<\/strong><\/p>\n

Your Pirelli calendar moment must last, at least, twenty score years;
\nNobody makes this very important point entirely clear.
\nSo, try to remember, while cavorting in the Sun,
\nThat the memories must endure, and for everyone!<\/p>\n

Call it, if you will, the great Burnishment.
\nWhen like two figures from a fabled myth or play,
\nYou roam the most remote shores and the very
\nEarth appears made for you both alone.<\/p>\n

It is the clich\u00e9 – you look on her then and on those mythic shores –
\nWith the aroma of wild rosemary, myrtle and Goat;
\nDesire bears you both ever onward with its emblazoned sail.<\/p>\n

Fast forward two decades now and she stands before you in your kitchen,
\nAnd the initial violence of the sun from that first day,
\nTell me, do you still feel its impact burning your skin?<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The Flies<\/strong>\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

The two house- flies, Beckett and Joyce, buzz about you
\nAnd the TV screen. There they land, buzz again
\nBefore flying off to Memphis copulating
\nAnd multiplying on the wing. As a sign of virility,<\/p>\n

The Egyptians displayed them on their amulets.
\nThat great race, unlike our own, had a great respect for insects!
\nEven the Greeks showed a similar respect,
\nWhen having a BBQ they offered a sacrifice to Shoo Fly Zeus.<\/p>\n

The crabby meat men, in this way, could eat their own
\nUndisturbed by patrolling swarms and Oxen that had fallen
\nWere replaced by Lotus Eater, and burning eucalyptus in the Sun.<\/p>\n

Now, you look at the books of both these modern sages
\nThat you have been reading for an eternity,
\nAnd still you hear the flies buzzing across the pages!<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The Vico Road <\/strong><\/p>\n

From the vantage point of Strawberry Hill,
\nA Victorian Villa recently selling for a cool 5 million,
\nA place more evocative of Raymond Chandler
\nThan anything remotely Irish. I am reminded,<\/p>\n

Again, of the Neapolitan philosopher who
\nPeopled his New Science <\/em>with giants. In fact,
\nWhile lunching there on one of the picnic tables,
\nI had a slightly hallucinatory vision of Gulliver<\/p>\n

Striding in 18th<\/sup> century breeches, and croppy hair
\nOver the Sugar- Loaf Mountain, while
\nThe Lilliputians below discussed the ongoing<\/p>\n

Business in the property sector: vulture funds
\nAnd NAMA; hedge funds in Texas,
\nWhere the multi-headed Cereberus roars.<\/p>\n

Feature Image: Daniele Idini<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Irish Rail Dublin, that old whore, with her piss -stained pavements Abruptly transforms into a woman of a certain station. Such are the, at once, brutal and subtle shifts where In an instant, Hell aligns in an altogether strict Congruence\u2026 Like when you climb aboard The final commuter train of the week on a Friday […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":237,"featured_media":14210,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[1449,6757,7115,7142,7152,7159,7169,7341],"class_list":["post-14148","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-poetry","tag-cassandra-voices-poetry","tag-oneill","tag-peter","tag-peter-oneill-cassandra-voices","tag-peter-oneill-irish-poet","tag-peter-oneill-poet","tag-peter-oneill","tag-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14148","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/237"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14148"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14148\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14148"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14148"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/casswp.eutonom.eu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14148"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}