Gin
I’m under the quilt when you insist
on extolling the spirit’s provenance:
the flourish of bog myrtle and star anise,
the murmur of rowanberry and angelica root.
You tell me it must be the quinine that’s
making me queasy and the metronome
I hear tapping is the prophylactic popping
of the fuchsia. And even though I have sown
myself into the bole of a tree, I will wake
naked to an oaken jacket seething on the floor.
There will be rings of lichen curling around
my tongue and decades of juniper beads
stuttering their rosary in my ear.
Poetry Ireland Review Issue 119:
Poetry Ireland Review Issue 119 includes new poems by 48 poets including Frank Ormsby, John Kinsella, Rachel Coventry, Aifric Mac Aodha, Gerald Dawe, Alice Miller and Claire Potter. Also included are translations by Richard Begbie and Kirsten Lodge, an essay on Bishop, Lowell, Heaney and Grennan by David McLoghlin, and reviews of Paul Muldoon, Paul Durcan, Sarah Clancy, Medbh McGuckian, Kate Tempest, George the Poet, and many more. The issue also features photography by Hugh O'Conor, Dominic Turner, Sheila McSweeney, Fergus Bourke and John Minihan.