Bun-na-margie Friary

Occasionally I took my sons
to Bun-na-margie Friary
to be free like street urchins,
for they had sand and sea the whole year round.
They would clamber up stone stairs and crawl
on the ruins of the mediaeval walls
to search for the keystone in the corbelled roof.

Sitting on the MacNaughten tomb
my pram an incongruity
in a house of celibacy,
a sense of place enabled me to relive its drama.

Brown robed sons of Assisi
troop out the western door
fingering girdled rosary,
reading over the grave of the Black nun
back to their chores and some
to the river for tomorrow's food.

Strains of chanted psalms
rising through the roofless nave,
blending in the sultry breeze
with wild bird songs.

Sombre tones;
a tolling bell and women's caoine*,
accompanying the coffin of Sorley Boy McDonnell;
stalwart clansmen carry the coffin
down from Dunaneannie
to rest among the bones of kinsmen,
in contrast to the stormy life he led
defying Elizabeth, feuding with McQuillan,
he died peacefully in his bed;
veteran of a turbulent age;
slaughter in Glentaise; the loud
battle cries, the carnage,
defeat by Shane the Proud.

Such disturbing scenes
are gone from Bun-na-margie,
rivals today, settle scores
on surrounding golf course greens.

From Flamingo Pink - new and collected poems
page 107
dedicated to Aidan

* Coaine - Irish for cry, howl