SEAMUS HEANEY
From Lightenings: VIII
The annals say: when the monks of Clonmacnoise
Were all at prayers inside the oratory
A ship appeared above them in the air.
The anchor dragged along behind so deep
It hooked itself into the altar rails
And then, as the big hull rocked to a standstill,
A crewman shinned and grappled down the rope
And struggled to release it. But in vain.
‘This man can’t bear our life here and will drown,’
The abbot said, ‘Unless we help him.’ So
They did, the freed ship sailed, and the man climbed back
Out of the marvellous as he had known it.
From Seeing Things (Faber & Faber, 1991).
Nerthus
For beauty, say an ash-fork staked in peat,
Its long grains gathering to the gouged split;
A seasoned, unsleeved taker of the weather
Where kesh and loaning finger out to heather.
From Wintering Out (Faber & Faber, 1972).
Available from Amazon.co.uk:
District
and Circle (Faber & Faber, 2006)
Beowulf:
A New Verse Translation (W. W. Norton, 2001)
Sweeney
Astray (Faber & Faber, 2001)
Electric
Light (Faber & Faber, 2001)
Opened
Ground: Poems 1966-1996 (Faber & Faber, 1998)
The
Spirit Level (Faber & Faber, 1996)
Seeing
Things (Faber & Faber, 1991)
New
Selected Poems, 1966-87 (Faber & Faber, 1990)
The
Haw Lantern (Faber & Faber, 1987)
Station
Island (Faber & Faber, 1984)
Selected
Poems, 1965-1975 (Faber & Faber, 1980)
Field
Work (Faber & Faber, 1979)
North
(Faber & Faber, 1975)
Wintering
Out (Faber & Faber, 1972)
Door
Into the Dark (Faber & Faber, 1969)
Death
of a Naturalist (Faber & Faber, 1966)