The Last Ambush

(Published in The Men of the West)

The Last Ambush

Blood pulsing into the high grass

As the skylark flung notes like confetti

Into the long evening, too late now,

A time for memories, her embraces,

Family, mother, a sudden jolt of pain,

Writhing as the cuckoo and blackbird sang,

Flies, sleep for a while, then a shower of rain

On the expressionless face and the letting go

As the priest and the doctor ran over the fields.

Others escaped into the hills near Skerdagh

But Kilroy was impatient, a few weeks after

They picked off the machine gunner three times, 

Let the others go, lenient, headed for the bogs, 

Slept under the stars, hiding behind rock and fern,

Waterfall echo, wind in the pines, rain spitting,

 Foxglove, sedge, sheep skulls and grey back crows, 

Long shadows, clouds skirting in a northerly over

Devilsmother, Glenawough lake, Sheeffrey, 

In the distance, Glenamong, Nephin, Currane,

Suddenly uniforms coming over the bray

Panic as they scatter again to safe houses.

Maybe it was that last ambush

That reversed the centuries of misery,

That last bullet fired for Emmett, Pearse,

The coffin ships and the wild geese,

Left us abandoned but free in an open boat

To sail without oars or sails in the dark

At the mercy of a fickle wind, becalmed,

To fight with ourselves, make our own mistakes,

The space sometimes filled with the self appointed

Hiding in the long grass, as we haemorrhaged.

Around now we can see the great canvas

Having recently shed the yokes,

Around now remember those who let go 

Under the skylarks brittle notes.