"Kids" by Mark Barry. A poem for Bernadette O'Donnell from Dublin who was killed in a youth-hosteling accident May 1980...

KIDS 

In Drimnagh

Walking down the silent volcano of

Benbulbin Road

Where the electric statues of the Immaculate Heart stand guard over the doorways

Squashing baddies and seeing off poxbottles all day and all of the night  

And the moss peat on rose bushes throttlin’ those prickly little shysters into growth 

And the big monkey tree stuck in the middle of the garden when it should be in a desert

And the Brendan Behan oul wans himmin' and hawin' over wonky hedges

With their whis whis-whisperin' about that quare wan next door… 

"Oh! Sacred Heart of Jayzuss Missus Brennan! The so-and-so never! 

Would I tell you a word of a lie Missus Walsh! 

Mother of God! And all the saints preserve us!" 

Through the deaf of you gone - Berni

I hear the beautiful sound of children 

School kids…

Screamin' and shoutin' at the top of their voices

Throwin' chewed-up biros at Jockser Doyle's funny lookin' egghead 

And big-mouth Crowley stickin' Golfball chewing-gum into his pencil box on the sly 

And fatso Bolger scoffin' down Aniseed Balls and Joyces of Cork Raspberry bars 

And farty-pants Decko with his cheek puffed-out on an everlasting gobstopper…

School kids…

Like an unstoppable torrent

Careering across the schoolyard

Swallowing up the World

I know how you loved those kids Berni - I know

The tears that would well up in your eyes 

When their loveliness touched you

And you'd reach out and hug me 

Excited for the future…

Let's go over and talk to them Berni

You and I - let's go over and talk to them

And grow in their warmth

And wallow

And bathe 

…In the lovely laughter of living…



The photograph is of Toner's Bar in Baggot Street in Dublin where we'd have a Guinness...

A poem for BERNADETTE O'DONNELL 

who was killed in a car-accident in Wicklow, Ireland while youth-hosteling - 3 May 1980

With all my love and affection - her one-time boyfriend 

Written between May 1980 and September 1982

Revisited November 2011, August 2013 and March 2016 

MARK BARRY from Dublin