Sitting with Patrick

Following dreary skies this morning, the weather cleared for a beautiful late June afternoon. Looking for something to do with the kids we returned to the Grand Canal for coffee and a stroll. Only this time, the young toddler was a fast and fearless two year old! Not quite so leisurely.

However, we did stop and sit with Patrick Kavanagh again which gives me an excuse to print another of his poems.

I was out on a walk last Good Friday and stopped into a small church where a choir was practicing. At the back was a book-counter with a few items for sale. I bought a book with a collection of Kavanagh's work just because of this poem:

A View of God and the Devil
Patrick Kavanagh

God

I met God the Father in the street
And the adjectives by which I would describe him are these:
Amusing
Experimental
Irresponsible -
About frivolous things.
He was not a man who would be appointed to a Board
Nor impress a bishop
Or gathering of art lovers.

He was not splendid, fearsome or terrible
And yet not insignificant.
This was my God who made the grass
And the sun,
And stones in streams in April;
This was the God I met in Dublin
As I wandered the unconscious streets.

This was the God that brooded over the harrowed field -
Rooneys - beside the main Carrick Road
The day my first verse was printed -
I knew him and was never afraid
Of death or damnation;
And I knew that the fear of God was the beginning of folly.

The Devil

I met the Devil too,
And the adjectives by which I would describe him are these:
Solemn,
Boring,
Conservative.
He was a man the world would appoint to a Board,
He would be on the list of invitees for a bishop's garden party,
He would look like an artist.
He was the fellow who wrote in the newspapers about music,
Got into a rage when someone laughed;
He was serious about unserious things;
You had to be careful about his inferiority complex
For he was conscious of being uncreative.