Last impressions

 February 2025  February 2025 Dublin has the feel of Christmas 2007. Last weekend we hosted a birthday party for my wife Lorraine in a top end city center Restaurant which was reassuringly expensive and packed to the gills.  I was overcome by a sense of dejà vu. I was transported back to halcyon days of Celtic Tiger Dublin when restaurants bulged with property developers. The only difference now is that it’s  the corporate lawyers and accountants and tech executives who pack round tables in loud voices straining to be heard.  My pessimistic and apocalyptic inner voice was screaming silently. This cannot last. This will not last. We are witnessing the last bonfire of the vanities. Deaf to the tragedies around the world and blind to our own demise thanks to the Trump tariffs the party continues on.  We must fondly remember these days of Government trade and fiscal surpluses.  For we shall never see them again. Not in my lifetime anyway. There is a storm ...

Sister death  Sister death she held his hand  Right throughout his life  Nearer than his siblings  Closer than his wife.   When at last the day came   To walk across the aisle   From this life to the next  They went without a fuss.  Grateful for the days and years  Happy for the joys and tears  This was ever but a journey  For them who cared to see.   What lies ahead? For no one knows   No praying priest no scientist  All predictions are simply shows  Of pious hopes and ignorance.   Life and death are intertwined   They follow close together   When it is time with luck he’ll know  And through the arches go   Embracing life, embracing death  Lived with grace and left with class  There is no heaven neither hell  Nothing to fear as we jump clear  May we be granted a wide long life  May our death be short and sweet...

The old man said...  The old man smiled and said  Quod dixi, dixi, nothing more to add  My words of wisdom such as they are,  Scattered lightly near and far.  For the most part fallen on deaf ears  But all of that is fine  The words at least were mine  Like God, misunderstood.  The people spoke, God damn them,  Democracy is naught  If half the population cannot read  And the other will not be taught.  Quod scripsi, scripsi, nothing more to write  No point in writing, morning noon and night  The seed - I’ll let it settle  See it makes the harvest right.  The words we share we never know  When or where they’ll land  What life or trail is changed  We’ll never understand. Quod dixi, dixi = I’ve said what I’ve said. Quod scrpsi, scripsi = I’ve written what I’ve written, attributed to Pontius Pilate who wrote ‘’Jesus of Nazareth King of the Jews’

Impressions    It was in the short days after Christmas Day when I counted the remaining twelve days with hope and reluctance I was despatched by my well meaning mother to art classes for children in town. The first few years saw me take the 61 bus across town to Parnell Square and the Hugh Lane gallery. Aged ten or eleven  I was smitten by the impressionist paintings I saw. Few in quantity but high in quality. Then began a lifelong long affair with Impressionism.  The venue changed around 1964 to the National Gallery of Ireland when James White became its charismatic director.   My wife and mother in law were big Van Gogh fans with his prints adorning the walls of their homes. Our children were steeped in the impressionist vernacular.  Then in the nineties the French had the brilliant idea of opening an Art Gallery to Impressionism in the condemned railway station Gare d’Orsay. Lorraine and I spent hours there when in Paris.  The nearby L...

The Rich are dancing The rich are dancing while the band  Are mentally home and gone to bed  The rich are holding close their partners   In the final tango of the dead.  Too late they grasp and clutch  At straws that blow across the floor  Last straws are blowing in the wind  Find me ten men who haven’t sinned.  Across the town an aging couple  Drink up last drinks and pay the bill  The piper must be paid they know  All bills are settled afore they go  All stars are cancelled on this night  When grace is rare and out of sight  The moon’s deserted and the dark  Wraps all her children in her skirts.  We knew this night would come  It wasn’t if but simply when  The Doomsday clock struck twelve  And time was frozen for all men.   Looking back it was ever clear  And in truth it mattered little  What chess pieces moved or stayed  Our fates were written in the stars....

Delicious Mountains.   Delicious mountains I could eat you  High, above the sunny plains  Beneath a sky that’s truly blue  Beside a sea that’s facing south.   The western wind scours the beaches  And whips white surf along the sands  Tourists stride released in t shirts  Locals take no chance with hats.  Winter rarely visits Nerja  Jewel of the precious south  Cooler nights remind us strangers  To wear our coats and pack some scarves.  Sitting at a cafe table  Boarded up for the season  Deafened by the winter surf  It will reopen come the summer.  Five in the evening the sun is shining  While back in Dublin it continues raining  How can a world be so divided  Flying south when you’re retired.  Lucky us to have a neighbour  Who charges nothing for her sea  Who feeds us cheaper than in Ireland   Good time and fortune  We will remember when kids clamor...

Holiday maker   Thank you gentle waiters  Who serve me on a Sunday   Who leave your beds and families  To spoil an Irish tourist.  Thank you gentle staff  Who sacrifice your evenings   To tend my every need  To wine and dine and feed.  I who have no divine right  To be sitting on your beaches  But you make me welcome all the same  In your sacred places.  I have only money  And money shouldn’t buy  The world and all its graces  The world’s vast open spaces.   I am sitting happy here  On my balcony  Above the crashing waves  Above the sparkling sea.  ‘What have I done?’, I ask  To deserve this guilty pleasure  ‘Nothing’ comes the answer   But lucky charms and accident.  Dearest waiter we are not worthy  To be served like royalty  This is your country after all  We are but passing through.  I am not entitled by my money  You do...

Three degrees   The Paris Climate Agreement was dead in the water before the ink dried on the thousand page document to mangle metaphors. Only the madly ambitious and the plainly mad believed for a moment that this objective was realistic. Christianity has been around for two thousand years. I rest my case.   My totally unqualified guesstimate at the time is that by the end of this century we would see an average increase of three degrees on a regular basis. All the scientific evidence points to my being more correct than Paris. I have charged nothing for my advice and could have saved billions in wasted time and money and tropical forests felled to produce the papers required.   We should work out as best we can the effects of a three degree rise and then plan for it while we still have time. What the world will look like in seventy five years time will not be pleasant and the temptation exists to shield the public from what they must know.   Forge...

Fifteen years  Fifteen years I’m coming here  Spring and summer, even winter,  An hour of quiet, undisturbed,  While we reflect and sit in silence.  The old yew tree has grown,  It’s filling now the window  Just a sliver of blue sky  That paints the way to heaven.   Here we sit with silver hair  Our future now uncertain  When we leave this meeting house  Unsure of who is left behind us.  Ours the job to lock the doors  Pass the torch, hand over keys   To small groups that meet at home  Where smaller windows greet the sky.  We’ll light the candle in the corners  Prevent the dark from coming in  Fill our hearts and homes with light  Keep a vigil through the night.