Beyond the Revolution is...

by Róisín Ní Mhóráin

Beyond the Revolution is…

The pounding of soldiers’ feet commemorating Easter, The Parade.
Well-drunk voices raised at closing time to howl in praise of Kevin Barry, martyred 50 years.
Stunned fear on Southern sofa’d faces when the evening telly names: ‘internment’,
Pictures: bodies hauled from homes by troops who wear another country’s cloth and gun.
The yawns of 20 years again, when, ‘up there, The North they’re at it still’.

Reproduced with kind permission of the author. This poem was composed in Poetry as Commemoration workshops held at the National Museum of Ireland — Country Life, Co. Mayo, in November, 2022. The workshops were led by poet Terry McDonagh.