Harbour Street, Tullamore

Jimmy O’Connell

Here are Sunday afternoon shoppers where another

time ago the silence of religious observation

hung penitentially, or, on occasion, a club

match in O’Connor Park might see a procession of men,

cigarettes in hand, nervously anticipating

county glory. I smell petrol fumes now, but also there,

in the air, unexpectedly, the smell of animal

piss, that clean sharp tang must have seeped into

these stones and cement grooved paths, released

now to stagger memory into life: calves slipping

and slithering down green urine slopped trailers;

pigs, pink and manure slathered, squealing in riotous

protest as farmers, nicotine fingered, Wellingtons

stuffed with brown stained dungarees, turn

and twist them into display. Smell has tricked me

into hearing my Grandmother, sending me to

Wrafters for a pound and a half of back rashers,

“And make sure he gives you Tullamore sausages.”

He still stands there behind the counter, flour dust

in his hair, slicing bacon; the smell of stale Guinness

lingering from behind the yellow glass frosted door.

“You too will be a memory like me, young fella.”

He wraps the sausages in grease paper, “Others will

remember you for the ordinary ould things.”

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.