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96 pages, Paperback
First published December 1, 2002
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About the author
Seán Lysaght
28 books7 followersSeán Lysaght was born in 1957 and grew up in Limerick. He was educated at UCD where he received a BA and an MA in Anglo-Irish Literature. He subsequently spent several years abroad, in Switzerland and Germany, before teaching at St Patrick’s College, Maynooth. He now lectures at the Galway-Mayo Institute of Technology and lives with his wife Jessica in Westport, County Mayo.
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Displaying 1 of 1 review
August 3, 2018
I had never heard of Seán Lysaght when this book fell into my hands in a second hand bookshop (Yarborough House in Bishop’s Castle) which allows one to dip into books while enjoying a coffee. This is a fatal trap for browsers. Opening the book at any random page brings up poems that are just obviously excellent and it was never really likely that I would leave this book behind, though the risk of letting my drink grow cold was real enough.
Seán Lysaght shares a name and is hopelessly mixed up on Amazon and Google, and also Goodreads, with the author of self-help books with titles to make you weep, like “PERSONAL SUCCESS: Alpha Habits: The Daily Habits, Principles, and Rituals to Take You from Loser to Legend.” In contrast, the authentic Seán Lysaght – how can the other be authentic? - is the author of the most gentle, lyrical poems in the pastoral setting of Kerry and Western Ireland.
For the avoidance of doubt, he sets out his rejection of machismo in his poem “A Souvenir.” It includes this exchange with a farmer:
[First, the farmer speaks:} Then, looking up for the first time: ‘You’ve to fight / For everything you get in this life.’
[To which the poet replies:] ‘What about / The stories you told, and the language you mastered? / Was that not washed up for free one day on the beech?’
The poet does not dispute economic imperatives but he does question their centrality: Of course I knew it was all a great improvement / on the hovels that inspired trendy designs / on machine knit sweaters and chunky pottery / but it wasn’t what I came for. Where was the space / that no one advertised, the barest elements / of a native tradition that isn’t for sale?’ He protests that the blether of an older language was lost / to the high street vernacular that we prefer.
Lines like that should be written up in the most beautiful calligraphy and framed. There is no doubt that modernity constantly jars with the poet’s preferred world, though he does not dispute his personal separation from much of this by virtue of his teaching career: and sure enough the question came: ‘what do you do / for a living? You have the look of a teacher.’ / My first reflex was to contradict him – ‘That’s true.’
His poetry is often very local and specific. A child arrives at school, knowing the names of all the islands around Kerry’s Atlantic shore, only to be told that what he sees as the great unknown mainland is itself only an island to the West of England and Europe. He gives several insights into his childhood, notably catching eels under the gaze of American tourists, and his love of nature is simply expressed. He writes of bird watching and praises the Gorse bush in its alternate names as Furze and as Whin.
But nothing in this book is parochial in a negative sense [To sustain this I have to set aside "The Books in My Room" which identifies the dismal contents of his childhood bookshelf, but this surely was later remedied; otherwise, I would weep for him.] He finds a link with Derek Walcott and the West Indies (Gulf Stream) by virtue of the eels reaching Irish rivers after crossing the Atlantic, while his sonnet in tribute to Gunter Grass (Gale Warning) picks up that German writer’s passionate appeal for the right of migrants and refugees to be received and accepted. In The Helmet of Messapus he sets out a story from the Aeneid, [I do not know if it is a translation or an invention based on that source] and demonstrates an ability to use the forms of poetry to carry a convincing narrative, something he also achieves in the lengthy poem sequence To Connacht, which is presumably autobiographical.
Any doubt of his intention to be identified as a skilled poet is resolved when he writes in A Stone’s Throw: you could extend the count to the syllables in / the British Overseas Airways Corporation, / that alexandrine along the length of the plane / we waved to the day Paddy went back to Boston. Just for my own benefit this scans as [The - Brit - ish - O - ver - seas ] [ Air ways - Cor - por - a - tion ] Okay Sean, that is an alexandrine. Is it relevant that Seamus Heaney also wrote of waving to a plane on its way to America? Should I compare their respective uses of the sonnet? No need. Every poet invokes every poet.
All this and more explains why I visit second-hand bookshops.
And why I rarely leave empty handed.
For all my best intentions.
I needed a coffee.
Seán Lysaght shares a name and is hopelessly mixed up on Amazon and Google, and also Goodreads, with the author of self-help books with titles to make you weep, like “PERSONAL SUCCESS: Alpha Habits: The Daily Habits, Principles, and Rituals to Take You from Loser to Legend.” In contrast, the authentic Seán Lysaght – how can the other be authentic? - is the author of the most gentle, lyrical poems in the pastoral setting of Kerry and Western Ireland.
For the avoidance of doubt, he sets out his rejection of machismo in his poem “A Souvenir.” It includes this exchange with a farmer:
[First, the farmer speaks:} Then, looking up for the first time: ‘You’ve to fight / For everything you get in this life.’
[To which the poet replies:] ‘What about / The stories you told, and the language you mastered? / Was that not washed up for free one day on the beech?’
The poet does not dispute economic imperatives but he does question their centrality: Of course I knew it was all a great improvement / on the hovels that inspired trendy designs / on machine knit sweaters and chunky pottery / but it wasn’t what I came for. Where was the space / that no one advertised, the barest elements / of a native tradition that isn’t for sale?’ He protests that the blether of an older language was lost / to the high street vernacular that we prefer.
Lines like that should be written up in the most beautiful calligraphy and framed. There is no doubt that modernity constantly jars with the poet’s preferred world, though he does not dispute his personal separation from much of this by virtue of his teaching career: and sure enough the question came: ‘what do you do / for a living? You have the look of a teacher.’ / My first reflex was to contradict him – ‘That’s true.’
His poetry is often very local and specific. A child arrives at school, knowing the names of all the islands around Kerry’s Atlantic shore, only to be told that what he sees as the great unknown mainland is itself only an island to the West of England and Europe. He gives several insights into his childhood, notably catching eels under the gaze of American tourists, and his love of nature is simply expressed. He writes of bird watching and praises the Gorse bush in its alternate names as Furze and as Whin.
But nothing in this book is parochial in a negative sense [To sustain this I have to set aside "The Books in My Room" which identifies the dismal contents of his childhood bookshelf, but this surely was later remedied; otherwise, I would weep for him.] He finds a link with Derek Walcott and the West Indies (Gulf Stream) by virtue of the eels reaching Irish rivers after crossing the Atlantic, while his sonnet in tribute to Gunter Grass (Gale Warning) picks up that German writer’s passionate appeal for the right of migrants and refugees to be received and accepted. In The Helmet of Messapus he sets out a story from the Aeneid, [I do not know if it is a translation or an invention based on that source] and demonstrates an ability to use the forms of poetry to carry a convincing narrative, something he also achieves in the lengthy poem sequence To Connacht, which is presumably autobiographical.
Any doubt of his intention to be identified as a skilled poet is resolved when he writes in A Stone’s Throw: you could extend the count to the syllables in / the British Overseas Airways Corporation, / that alexandrine along the length of the plane / we waved to the day Paddy went back to Boston. Just for my own benefit this scans as [The - Brit - ish - O - ver - seas ] [ Air ways - Cor - por - a - tion ] Okay Sean, that is an alexandrine. Is it relevant that Seamus Heaney also wrote of waving to a plane on its way to America? Should I compare their respective uses of the sonnet? No need. Every poet invokes every poet.
All this and more explains why I visit second-hand bookshops.
And why I rarely leave empty handed.
For all my best intentions.
I needed a coffee.
Displaying 1 of 1 review