The Mauve Hills

 

Six years old he stands the same height
as the cello and still idealises his father
their lead singer, who drunkenly reels
between the instruments.
This is his father's band, these lyrics
are in the language of the isles,

A wedding party perhaps six miles
to the east of the Donegal border,
the mauve hills still in sight
with wild geese swooping over their tips
as if, but for the checkpoints and barbed wire
he might have walked those few,
scarce hedgerows into the Free State.

He is too far west of the Bann
for him to recall that this is occupied land
though the roads are quieter
though the signposts are in one language only
though there are new yellow number plates
and few of the white ones of home.
This farmhouse is like any to the South.

the young couple dance, enthralled
as children arch their feet like words.
A moment of light-footed ballet is broken
now by the screech of gunfire,
the awkward creep of tanks in the sunset hills,
His father’s language such a stigma.