“… as the deluge subsides and the waters fall short
we see the dreary steeples of Fermanagh and Tyrone
emerging once again.” Winston Churchill, 16.02.1922
The must-have present on the Christmas tree
for any ageing Brexit male should be
an Airfix model kit of the Spitfire
symbolic of the Spirit of Empire
(but loathe to trace its name back to Shakespeare
and know itself as some post-modern Lear).
The afternoon has dwindled into night,
the finished model stands in fading light,
and here the child is father to the man
for though he followed each step in the plan
there always was one little extra bit
left over and impossible to fit.
He knows at last that it will take the People’s
Vote to glue back on ‘the dreary steeples’.
Iggy McGovern is a poet and a Fellow Emeritus in the School of Physics at Trinity College Dublin; he has published three collections with Dedalus Press: The King of Suburbia (2005), Safe House (2010) and The Eyes of Isaac Newton (2017). A Mystic Dream of 4, a poetic biography of William Rowan Hamilton, 19th century Irish Mathematician & Poet, is published by Quaternia Press (2013). His awards include the Ireland Chair of Poetry Bursary, the Glen Dimplex New Writers Award for Poetry and the Hennessy Literary Award
POETRY SUBMISSIONS
Poetry submissions should be sent via email only, to poetry@irishtimes.com. No hard copy manuscripts and no single poem submissions. Please submit selection of 3-4 poems. Due to volume of submissions it is not possible to provide feedback on individual poems. If poems are not accepted there should be no further submission for six months and if published, for a year. Due to volume of submissions a response may take some time.
