Miceál Kearney

Make a Wish

In this sunny meadow sheep bleat.
Today is my birthday.
The evening breeze
blows out my candles.
The sheep still bleat.

Before I go,
each guest will get some cake—
rude not to share.
Five pieces I will cut:
the sun, the wind, the sheep
and me.
The last piece I will keep
for the moon.

Under a Sapling Beech

I began working the potato pit,
forcibly at first. Pockets bursting
with unblighted dreams.
Every year... another ring.

As I too matured, went to work in the fields
first with ass, then Massey.
Picked and filled the pit,
covered with earth and straw.
Regularly had to pake
and pick the rotting ones out.

Common Agricultural Policies,
ALDI and arthritis have made redundant
the grey bucket that brought the spuds
into mother—now collecting rain
from the broken gutter.

And the beech tree is dead.
Felled. Its rotted falling fingers
disturb the grave of the departed pit.
My pockets have long since blighted.
No ring on my finger.