If You Have The Words, There's Always

Poetry Is Always Slightly Mysterious, And You Wonder What Is Your Relationship To It.

As Writers And Readers, As Sinners And Citizens, Our Realism And Our Aesthetic Sense Make Us Wary Of Crediting The Positive Note.

I Always Believed That Whatever Had To Be Written Would Somehow Get Itself Written.

One Of The Very First Poems I Wrote Was Docker That Fist Would Drop A Hammer On A Catholic And One Of The Sturdiest Was Requiem For The Croppies, Written 50 Years After 1916 [the Year Of The Easter Rising]. Being Responsible And What It Means, What It Demands, Have Indeed Preoccupied Me Maybe Too Much. But This Is It, This Is The Thing, This Is What You're Up Against.

Irish Readers, British Readers, American Readers: Is It Odd That I Haven't A Clue About How Differently They React? Or Better Say, I Cannot Find The Words To Describe My Hunch About Them.