Fog

Gabriel Rosenstock

Fog falls, trickling softly on Glengower.

They’ve never seen the likes before

(not since the death of folklore).

It settles on things no longer there

the parish pump

a baby’s bones

Gaelic manuscripts: a version of Virgil

by one Seán Bán an Ghleanna.

It falls on things that never existed

on the baguette which the sculptor

M. Thierry Gillet carries through the town

and which is not a baguette at all

reminds him of home, Rennes.

Someone decides this fog can be eaten.

She tastes a teaspoon of it and is content

publishes a few recipes in the local rag

fog with honey, with nuts ... that sort of thing.

Someone else is of a mind to take a sample of said fog

and send it up to the Government

in case it’s any danger to the public.

Another says, wasn’t it the bloody Government that issued it in the first place.

After that, no one ventured out till the fog cleared.

Poetry Ireland Review Issue 124:

Edited by Eavan Boland

Poetry Ireland Review 124 contains new poems from Paula Meehan, Ciarán O'Rourke, Lizzy Nichols, Mark Ward, Gabriel Rosenstock, Özgecan Kesici, Doireann Ní Ghríofa, and many other compelling voices. Also included is Eilean Ni Chuilleanáin's remembrance of her Cork childhood, excerpted from The Vibrant House: Irish Writing and Domestic Space, a book of essays reviewed in issue 124 by Caitríona O'Reilly. Other books considered in this issue include collections from Annemarie Ní Churreáin, Mark Granier, Tara Bergin, The Cambridge Companion to Irish Poets, and the Collected Poems of the late Dennis O'Driscoll, and there's also a short interview with Thomas Kinsella along with an essay on Kinsella as poet and civil servant. Another Kinsella is this issue’s Featured Poet, Alice Kinsella, and all artwork for the issue is supplied by artists associated with the Olivier Cornet Gallery on Great Denmark Street, around the corner from Poetry Ireland.

Available now to purchase online or in all good bookstores.