Niall OConnor: Pallas Lake

At Pallas Lake, the waves whisper tales of what was before,

and the cradle of Moses lies waiting still,

entangled somewhere in the tall reed boundaries,

and attended by a pair of acolyte swans

secured by its promise of deliverance.

Two cormorants cruciform perch motionless

in the skeleton of winter trees, on the sunken island

- once a home -

moated by waters that bent both bronze and steel;

a rippling gateway for swift passage

to another world.

Sit awhile on the whale bone logs of long dead trees,

bog-blackened and cracked by the drying restless wind,

and find - here on the lower lake - a lonesome

memory-stone of a young life tragically lost

in a playground turned deathly cold.

The swans rarely trespass here;

only the oaring wheeze of their wing beats overhead,

as they change from one feeding ground to another,

with a brief salute to the emptiness, on their passing.

A rosary of freshly painted houses surrounds the lake

and a pair of hand-raised walls, windowed with patches of sky,

stand as a last salute to an arrogance long since faded,

only seen now, because the low winter’s sun points it out to me.

Where the lake empties,

a castle that once lorded this lake and landscape,

now an island of fallen stone and redundant unions

grown through with whitethorn,

and shat on by every sheltering cow.

Mortality casts a long shadow o'er these ancient lands.

‘And even though the mountain must crumble,

and the strong timber beam must break,
and the wise man wither away like a plant,’

this lake will forever hold secrets in its limestone lighted depths,

safe from the wide enquiring gaze, of all who pass this way.

(First published Tullamore Tribune Mar 2023)

Niall OConnor