A Quartet for Lysaght

                                                        hommage à Shane McGowan

1

we had met gods
                                            in detritus
                                            of London
                                we had met you, tall

paddling buttermilk manna
                                from an
                                imbas oven


                                            raw Dagda
                                bequiffed

                                            in ether
                                but available

2

the polis groaning
                sounding itself

the pained birds
Baudelairean or Eliotian

                urbs underbelly
                chiming you

circles of hell
reserved for living
                                cloth doused in
                                petrol

3

Apollo landings
and the glow of the sun
                                a shade
                                of JFK

Lugh pushing

the wheelchair of Cuchulainn
up
a never-ending London hill
to clatter down again

4

through gelignited holes in your mouth
spat
distilled air’s
isms and versicles
glenside and rose moon
poetry excarcerated
drudgery annulled

                                the city droning
                                to a metronome
                                of ticking clocks
                                and judges’ gavels