‘Michaelmas Daisies’ is published in Poetry Ireland Review, Issue 121, edited by Eavan Boland.

‘Funeral Cortège As Umbilical Cord’

One of the first poems I had published was in the gorgeous Galway magazine Crannóg. It’s a love sonnet for Frank called Dragon Pearls. Eight years ago now since that day in Java’s on Abbeygate Street. Still one of my very very favourites…

‘The Secret Wife of Jesus’ is published in Poetry Ireland Review, Issue 133, edited by Colette Bryce. It is inspired by this painting by Greek artist Katerina Tsempeli called ‘Fellow Travellers’.

THE SECRET WIFE OF JESUS

 after the painting ‘Fellow Travellers’ by Katerina Tsempeli

It is our first holiday together and the alleyways of Chania see us

holding hands in a way the Latin Quarter of Galway hasn’t yet.

Something about a painting draws you, then me, into a gallery.

The couple in it are tourists on a ferry, unaware of the artist’s gaze.

The man’s elbow rests on a railing, his right hand surrendered

to the woman, who stands over it, focused as a manicurist.

We see him watching her from under a piece of white muslin, cast

loosely over him. His dark beard makes the scene feel biblical,

but also, ever-so-slightly erotic, as our eyes follow the trailing

strings of a polka-dot bikini down the curve of her spine to a low-

slung sarong. We wonder what it is she could be doing…maybe

removing a thorn or something? Behind them, sea and sky merge

in blue and purple hues that bleed into their outlines, to halo them

in a greenish light so divine, it looks like the wedding of Helios

and Artemis, where the moon is holding the outstretched hand

of the sun. We move closer, to see how the artist has done it.

Fine lines in the acrylic and oil pastels are like the secrets of a lost

gospel where Mary Magdalene was never a prostitute

and where the Son of God was conceived during a night of mind-

blowing sex. You are thinking of the word forgiveness, for some reason.

I reach for another: worship. The artist’s husband, Kostas, offers us

a shot of raki and limoncello. Our tongues warm with aniseed

and citrus. We wander into a church after that. There is mass on.

A handful of people are filing up to communion. I get the sudden urge

to receive, though it’s forbidden, and for you too, us being divorced

and, clearly unrepentant about it, therefore: sinners.

Squeezing hands and smiling, we make for the bright light of the exit.

I conjure-up the couple from our Aegean terrace later. They drink

wine and break bread into sweet Cretan olive oil. I close my eyes.

Then Jesus, to the bridal chamber, he leads me with torches.