End of Year Party '08/'09

Wicklow Writers have ended their season for '08/'09 with a bit of a party, a whole lot of work-in- progress and a meeting with special Poetry guests.

At their end of season drinkypoos they were joined by guests Angela Patten and Daniel Lusk, two famous poets now living in Vermont USA who happen to be married, to each other (what do two poets talk about over breakfast, maybe the simile of cornflakes being like flakes of corn ! )

Angela and Daniel, who both teach poetry as well as writing and publishing poetry, told fascinating tales of classes, students, and life in the wildwoods being visited by bears, racoons and mooses (plural of moose??) and probably mice as well.

Thank you Angela and Daniel for a great night. We even took a photo to show we weren't drunk, much.

Pictured with the Wicklow Writers Group were Guest Poets from Vermont, Angela Patten,(2nd from left, front row) and Daniel Lusk(right, back row)

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Wicklow Writers who attended the End Year Bash included:

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Back Row

Carol Boland, Gerry Sheridan, Martin Swords, Fainche Natoff

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Front Seated

Cáit Breathnach, Eithne Wright , Edward Ryan

Bealtaine Festival - May 09

At a reading in Wicklow Library as part of the Bealtaine Festival of May ’09 Wicklow Writers facilitated a session of stories, poems and tales of old times entitled  “The Good Old Days”.

 

They could have talked all night, and very nearly did!

 

 

Pictured at the session are

 

Edward Ryan -  Nora Fleming - Martin Swords 

     Margaret Bloomer - Cáit Breathnach

 

Special thanks to all at Wicklow Library for organising the session and inviting Wicklow Writers

 

Martin Swords

'Bard' by E.J. Ryan (April 1994)

I would not claim the name of ‘bard’,

or even one of high regard.

In truth this labour’s much too hard

to gain respect.

For in the end there’s scant reward,

and that’s a fact.

When thoughts pour out upon the page.

Some are foolish, other’s sage.

A few, restricted by the age,

Seem out of place.

The poet, by using every gauge,

must set the pace.

Reader, please have pity for a bard

who, finding that his muse comes hard,

then fails to play the trumping card

and win the game.

Think twice before you say, “blackguard,

you’ll not find fame.”

Sometimes the mind’s a deep dark den

when words flow sluggish from the pen,

and worse to try to make them blend,

so kind reader permit,

some licence when he fails to end

for lack of wit.

Rejoice when sometimes words combine

to raise your soul with thoughts that shine,

to swell your heart, to thrill your mind,

that you may think,

at last! at last! here is a rhyme

that’s worth the ink.