Leopold

Joyce would have written something profound no doubt
Craning his neck (and his eyes) his poor, poor eyes
Squinting at the squirming page trying to read between the lines
And no doubt his mother would look up from her pastry
Rubbing her flour thickened fingers on apron fold
Looking to her son so many miles away, who in turn
Dreamed of the Dublin of our childhood, the familiar streets
The smells and short-cuts home, past buildings long since worn
Away, even Rome is in decay, a million patios built from its bones

I often think of him, though I did not know this man
At times I have felt something fatherly in his words,
That familiar patronising tone of art in its innocence
I dreamt we took a drink together, made jokes and talked of girls
The way men do, looking at the world as a woman that will never
Return our advances, these two lads with their bad eyes
And perhaps, when the drink was gone and tobacco had long since
Gone to smoke, I’d help lift him from his chair and guide him home
To his wife, his sweet wife, who clung like a barnacle to her love

PCW March 2006