"It'll come to you this love of the land. There's no gettin' away from it if you're Irish" - Gone With the Wind
Failte!
I'm excited to share my adventures with all of you! I want your first taste of my life in Ireland to be this poem that I wrote very late one night when I was a Junior in College. Its meaning seems eerily prophetic now. More than anything, I've created this blog to make the actualization of this life-long dream of mine visible to those I love: my friends who are my foundation, my endlessly supportive family, my mentors and co-workers who inspire me, and my former students who have given me enough satisfaction and fulfillment to last two lifetimes... Have the courage to believe that your wildest dreams can come true.
Is fhearr fheuchainn na bhith san duil, (It is better to try than to hope)
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Mourn (A Seaside Peak in Southern Ireland)
The dark, earthen sod saturates her fair feet, but briefly since she frolics fast in knee high blades of greenest grass that blow dizzily in the Celtic-sea air.
Her wool skirt, stiffened by ware of evenings past is splashed by cresting waves that break against a beach blacker than her hair. Those once stiffer fibers were loosed by nights upon nights of hanging perfectly on his line before being wildly blown dry by the crisp Hibernian salt air.
The pair sits to rest a while instead of dodging breakers or skipping paler stones.
"Indian summer's here," he says softly, but all of summer here feels like the edge
of autumn to her, even though she grins in agreement
as she dangles her pale, soft feet off Achilles' peak, where Erin's vermillion-gold sky meets an ocean that is grey with years.
She sleeps with her eyes closed tight most nights. He asks her if she believes in Tier-Nan-Og, and she asks him if he believes in anything eternal. Outside the tide is rising, or it's receding— She never can tell but for the strengthened smell of salty freshness strained through his light, lace curtains.
She thinks to herself that he is like trying to hold the sea
and she imagines the water running between her fingers-- clenched so tight.
And so, the night calls her out of her sleeping, like daytime chides her into dreaming. She slips her white fingers through the holes of an old loose scarf that affords her more company than warmth on these newborn autumn evenings. She is off-- Night clouds reflect emerald from land to sea, And the tara that she never eyes from long hours of staring too far into star blanketed skies, feels cool against the thickening pads of her pallid feet.
Elisabeth Lewis (2005)
06 December 2011
The little things.
And students protesting the Irish government's education grant revocation with a papier mache Phoenix over the Liffey
Sure! Irish students don't get Federal Loans like we do, they get Federal Grants (meaning they don't have to pay them back) which, I know, as an American sounds pretty amazing, but you have to consider the small population and the brain drain that has gone on here, so there's a big incentive to keeping Irish young people in college. However, because of the end of Celtic Tiger and the economic downturn, funding is on the chopping block, so the requirements and access to grants for college students might be going away completely for need and academic basis. You can imagine how awful this would be, so on Saturday there was a mock funeral for the grants held from Trinity College in the city center, down O'Connell street. No one was watching--everyone just sort of joined in and marched. This picture is on the O'Connell bridge.
Tell us more about the politics behind the grant revocation...
ReplyDeleteSure! Irish students don't get Federal Loans like we do, they get Federal Grants (meaning they don't have to pay them back) which, I know, as an American sounds pretty amazing, but you have to consider the small population and the brain drain that has gone on here, so there's a big incentive to keeping Irish young people in college. However, because of the end of Celtic Tiger and the economic downturn, funding is on the chopping block, so the requirements and access to grants for college students might be going away completely for need and academic basis. You can imagine how awful this would be, so on Saturday there was a mock funeral for the grants held from Trinity College in the city center, down O'Connell street. No one was watching--everyone just sort of joined in and marched. This picture is on the O'Connell bridge.
ReplyDelete