At Gleannagalt

Doireann Ní Ghríofa

When the moon clambers her dark ladderinto the loft, I stumble a chestnut path,dropped cobbles, brown knots.Twigs grip tangles grip twigs;moonlit fern-fingers beckonto where the valley winks,and when I kneel to the well’s sunken eye,the cure looks back,but those blue eyes aren’t mine.Gleann na nGealtNuair a dhreapann gealach na gcoinleachan dréimire dorcha go barr na hoíche,is garbh iad na géagaa scuabann mo chuid gruaige.Ligeann méara glasa an chreamhaeolas na slí liom. Na cnónna sleamhna tharam,cromaim ag an tobar.An leigheas, bronntar,ach is dústrainséartha an tsúil a stánannar ais orm. Súil fhuar. Súil ghorm.

Poem translated into English, from Irish, by the author

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Headshot of Doireann Ní Ghríofa
Photo:
Bríd O'Donovan

Doireann Ní Ghríofa (b. 1981) is author of seven books of poetry, most recently Lunulae: New & Selected Poems in Translation. Her writing has been awarded the Rooney Prize for Irish Literature, the James Tait Black Prize, the Markievicz Award, and a Lannan Literary Fellowship. Her prose début A Ghost in the Throat finds an 18th century poet haunting a young mother, leading her through visions of blood, milk, lust, and murder. Written on the rooftop of a free car park in Cork, it went on to be translated into 19 languages and was described as “powerful” (New York Times), “captivatingly original” (The Guardian), and a “masterpiece” (Sunday Business Post).

“[Her] poems excel in their consideration of motherhood, particularly its paradoxical losses and gains, separation and unity… long-considered obsessions are explored with tenderness and unflinching curiosity.”
–Poetry Magazine

“Like [Eavan] Boland, Ní Ghríofa constructs a mysterious world for her readers from the matter of ordinary life. The poems… impress upon us that magic and depth can be found in the minutiae of the everyday.”
–Poetry Ireland Review

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