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Tuesday, January 5, 2021

A Poem for Nollaig na mBan

 


Two Women with a Candle, Peter Paul Reubens 1616-1617

I'd like to share this poem with you for Nollaig na mBan (Women's Christmas). I wrote it last year during a writing challenge. The weather was decidedly different to the blast of ice we're getting at the moment. Oíche Nollaig na mBan is a famous Irish poem by Seán Ó Ríordáin. Mostly this piece is dedicated to the women in my life, and to the ancestors. Thanks to The Meath Chronicle for publishing it this week too. May peace, health and happiness be with you in these times of uncertainty and in the coming year. 


Dinner Guests


Bhí fuinneamh sa stoirm a éalaigh aréir

(There was power in the storm that escaped last night)

- Oíche Nollaig na mBan, by Seán Ó Ríordáin


Through the bare fields the wind comes howling in the darkness

of the January pre-dawn, a creature born of the Cailleach’s dreams,

a spilled drop of the thought-cauldron premature of Imbolc,

a storm in a teacup of milky daylight.


There could be rain in its lashing and thrashing about,

soft, mild drizzles as it has not been so cold yet.

The witch barely stirs, turned on her side and dropped

deeply into dormancy, consciousness’ only sign snowdrops.


The making of coffee is a lure into the morning,

its bitter warm flavour a restorative, its taking a ritual

more potent on the sunrise of Nollaig na mBan

that is an ending and a beginning.


Did the old people accept transitions more readily?

Their hours were slower, less in real time, part of a feed. 

Though of course they were in real time, past and future blurred,

the present must have been everything, moments golden


in the fire’s flame, little things noticed, blades of grass,

the appearance of a bird, a tumbled stone. 

All the secret signs of nature they stored as knowledge

and a folklore passed from talk to song to paper. 


She mumbles in sleep, decides to show a bad face

and there is a séance-like static to now driving showers.

The weakness of daybreak casts watery shadows on the wall,

the gridded windowpane an open cell of rippled light.


My Great Grandmother bakes apples with a spoonful of sugar, 

my father’s mother butters toast and cuts it into squares. 

Granny and my mother share leftover pudding together.

Later I will prepare dinner for my nieces and sister.


Orla Fay



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